Scott O'Keeffe wrote:
>
> Your original post suggested that cats or dogs are several orders of
> magnitude more abundant than foxes. If there are 50,000 dogs in Brisbane,
> your assessment implies that there are about 500 foxes in Brisbane. There
> would certainly be more than 500 foxes in Brisbane. In suggesting that
> foxes are very common in Brisbane, I mean that, for a top level predator,
> they are very common. Compared with estimates of fox density from other
> locations, it can also be said that foxes are very common in Brisbane.
> 10,000 is not too likely, but I wouldn't rule this out as a possibility for
> greater Brisbane. As far as I know, no exhaustive surveys have been
> undertaken for GB.
>
> As far as diet goes, few studies have been done in the Brisbane area, and
> not many have been done in urban areas generally. Best work comes from
> Melbourne. One study I was involved in looked at scat samples from the
> Boondall wetlands and surrounds. The most common vertebrate remains in fox
> scats in that study were bandicoot. Still common around Brisbane, but in
> southern populations centres, disappearing, and foxes are heavily
> implicated. Surprisingly, the remains contained no evidence of hares.
>
> Brush Turkeys? As I understand it, recruitment for Brush Turkeys in
> suburban Brisbane is low, and it has been suggested that the birds seen in
> the outer suburbs move into these areas from outlying forest. I havn't seen
> any evidence to prove or disprove the idea that foxes take Brush Turkeys.
> The fact that we see Turkeys around the 'burbs is not necessarily evidence
> of a lack of predation. Foxes could be picking the Turkeys off, providing
> vacant territories for birds dispersing from outlying forest areas. Perhaps
> these vacant territories are rapidly filled by 'new' birds, conveying the
> impression that individual birds survive in an area year after year. Are
> the Turkeys we see from one year to the next the same birds, or 'new' birds
> which have taken up vacant territories? I also repeat what I said
> previously about eggs. Foxes love eggs, and eggs in a large heap of
> decaying organic material....? You can't tell me that isnt likely to
> attract foxes.
>
I doubt the Mt Gravatt turkey population is heavily predated - I used to
live in a different street and had a long term mound the other side of
the back fence [see references to Lord Jim, sire of many young turks in
the archives]. I remember seeing three young turks moving through my
yard in convoy, and I saw another emerge from the mound.
As for the number of pet cats and dogs in the Brisbane metro area, I
would expect there to be a couple of hundred thousand ...
LK
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