birding-aus

blackbirds

To: <>, "John Leonard" <>
Subject: blackbirds
From: "Philip A. Veerman" <>
Date: Wed, 27 Sep 2000 16:53:24 +1000
John Leonard wrote "I'm surprised by how little Blackbirds seem to impinge on native birds in
Canberra, they don't seem very numerous or visible at all." 
Well it may SEEM so to John but the data indicates otherwise. The species is the 15th most often recorded species (based on 17 years of COG's GBS) and the 6th most often recorded breeding species comprising 2.268% of the total bird fauna of Canberra. It is also the 6th most often recorded breeding species. Its numbers increased steadily over the first ten years of the GBS and for the last seven years its abundance has steadily declined (though still above the levels of 1981. This is hardly an insignificant species. As others have said, it infiltrates quite extensively into surrounding bushland.
 
Philip
-----Original Message-----
From: John Leonard <>
To: <>
Date: Tuesday, 26 September 2000 14:05
Subject: [BIRDING-AUS] blackbirds

I'm surprised by how little Blackbirds seem to impinge on native birds in
Canberra, they don't seem very numerous or visible at all. On the other
hand I am impressed by the way that they have spread to places like
Robinvale on the Murray (so unlike northern Europe).

What does surprise me is that they haven't discovered Wet Forest by now
(the habitat closest to their original one in Europe); if they had I'm sure
they'd have been through it like the proverbial dose of salts, in the
process displacing various ground feeders.

However it doesn't appear that they have, so let's hope there's something
wrong with se Australian Wet Forest, from a Blackbird point-of-view (not
enough worms, not the right sort of worms, or whatever) and that Australian
Wet Forests stay Blackbird free (unlike NZ forests, and the bush on Lord
Howe Island).

John Leonard
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
John Leonard
Research Officer
Embassy of the Republic of Korea
113 Empire Circuit,
Yarralumla, ACT 2600
p: 02 6270 4115
f: 02 6273 4839

Nothing in this e-mail should be read
as an _expression_ of the opinion or policy
of the Embassy of the Republic of Korea
in Australia, or of the Government of the
Republic of Korea.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


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