Forwarded from Harvey.
-----Original Message-----
From:
[
Sent: Monday,
4 September 2006 10:39
AM
To: Overs,
Anthony (REPS)
Subject: Sad news re chats
Some very sad news re the
Uriarra/Coppins Crossing Roads White fronted Chats. They were breeding! (which
is not the sad news, and explains why they were hanging around longer than I
think anyone expected), but the attempt failed in the most desperate way.
I had dropped by there on
Sunday 27 August (on my way out to check that the Uriarra Crossing Common
Sandpiper hadn’t yet returned) and noticed that the male was carrying
something in his bill. So I stopped off again on the way back and watched,
waited and sleuthed until after a couple of hours I finally located a nest with
two half-grown nestlings. I got some great photos of them which I’ll put
on the COG Photo Gallery at some stage.
But I was devastated when
I returned to check on their progress on Saturday 2 September to find that the
rank weedy patch on the SW side of Uriarra Road where they had been nesting had
been completely slashed / mowed! Grass, weeds, briars, bushes, nest and
nestlings – all gone. I waited around to do a 2-ha 20-minute survey
but saw no sign of the adults. This is the first time in five visits that I
have not seen the chats within about 5 minutes.
I’d kept quiet
about the chats breeding to protect them from possible interference at a very
vulnerable period, but now I feel, illogically, that had I made it known, maybe
somehow the slashing of the area might have been postponed by a few weeks to
allow the nestlings to fledge. I almost feel like I’d rather not have
discovered the breeding attempt so I could assume that the chats had simply
moved on…
Harvey
