Magpie-lark with attitude -nesting times

["Philip Veerman" <>]

Extract of relevant part from the 21 Year GBS Report, with bits in bold to highlight:

 

Magpie-lark Grallina cyanoleuca

This bold and confiding bird is well adapted to the suburban and even urban environments. Some will accept hand feeding. Some individuals will attack people when nesting but they are not as bad as Australian Magpies. They often display aggression towards Australian Magpies (which ignore them). Adult males, adult females and the juveniles are each easily distinguished by the pied pattern of the head. They are among our most regular species, present all year and with a consistent small amplitude monthly pattern. This is probably because the species maintains permanent evenly spaced territories. From a minimum in October they rise smoothly to a maximum in March, then decline smoothly again. This is only minor variation and is due to two factors. The spring drop reflects some birds moving away from garden areas for breeding or lowered counts if birds are undetected when on nests. The autumn rise reflects new young birds in the population becoming independent and the birds forming flocks and being counted in larger aggregations (though at fewer sites). Single observations of over 20 birds (sometimes up to 100) are mostly during autumn and early winter. Long-term numbers have had a smooth to undulating increase. Being a widespread species, this trend is across the board. It has clearly been contributed to by Site 230 that has habitat to support large groups.

Breeding records have fluctuated but there is a strong increasing trend. The breeding period is long, there are many records that suggest double brooding. A full breeding event appears to take up 19 weeks. One record contained breeding data for two events continuously for 23 weeks. Some nest building starts in early August but mostly they start in September, mostly activities at nest have finished by end of January. Dependent young from late November, peaks in January, finishes in late March.
Graphs on page: 101, Rank: 5, Breeding Rank: 4, Breeding graph on page: 106, A = 2.02629, F = 98.28%, W = 52.0, R = 73.612%, G = 2.75.

Of course the breeding graph on page 106 (of the 21 year edition) shows the timing of breeding trend precisely and succinctly.

Philip