Hot off the Press! BirdLife Australia’s beach-nesting birds team and volunteers are celebrating the announcement of the listing of the Hooded Plover (Eastern population) as Vulnerable under Australia’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act!
While this may sound like an odd thing to be celebrating, its listing is of great benefit to the birds because for the first time there is recognition of a problem that is of a national scale. If we can take the first major step to recognising a problem and defining the key actions we need to take to mitigate threats, then we make great progress in our journey to species recovery.
While BirdLife Australia has had the foresight to take action over the past decade, we now have ‘top down’ support via this listing, which will enable us to better detect developments that may have a negative impact, to access a broader range of funding sources, and to lend emphasis to the species and threats when we partake in NRM prioritisation exercises. The benefits go on and on...
A huge thanks to all the volunteers and land managers who provided data through years of biennial counts, breeding success monitoring and through allowing us to implement on-ground management. Well done! Now to move the Hooded Plover down the threat status ranks! Here we go!!
