My apologies, for those who are not familiar with this study, I have copied the abstract below, the study was carried out on a 10 ha site at Moruya NSW. Regards Jack Holland
The details of a breeding season have been investigated and described for many bird species and groups of species, but rarely for an entire breeding community. The collection of such data is the only way of quantifying the number of birds
a habitat can support, how many fledglings it can produce, and the avian diversity that can exist in the habitat. Without these quantitative and qualitative measures, the significance of particular habitats for avian conservation is difficult to assess. We
have accumulated comprehensive data on a breeding bird community on a 10 ha site for eight seasons, which has enabled us to condense the many aspects of breeding into an ‘average’ breeding season. The breeding community consisted of 44 species, which used
all of the site for nesting. Some species bred each season, while others bred as infrequently as once in the eight seasons. Nesting occurred between the beginning of August and the end of January, different species showed markedly different starting and finishing
times, and there were different temporal patterns of breeding within the breeding periods of the different species. The number of pairs that bred on the site varied each season, a pattern that we have previously shown to be related to the value of the Southern
Oscillation Index before the start of the season. Nest success rates varied considerably between species, but the overall success rate on the site was approximately 50%. We estimate that the spotted gum forest habitat on the south-east coast of Australia (1200
km2 ) produces approximately 1.5 million fledglings each season.
From: <>
Sent: Sunday, 11 July 2021 11:38 AM
To: <>
Subject: FW: Paper
Hello COG members/chat line subscribers, I expect quite a few of you would be interested in the overall summary of this major comprehensive breeding study which Michael Guppy has told us about over
a number of COG meetings.
Unfortunately it is too big (4 Mb) to post on the COG Chatline, but I’m happy to forward it to anyone who is interested in receiving a copy.
Jack Holland
From: M and S Guppy <>
Sent: Saturday, 10 July 2021 3:47 PM
To: Jack & Andrea Holland <>
Subject: Paper
Jack, since I have given so many talks to the group, I thought you would be interested in our latest paper, which brings all of the work together.
Please pass it on to any members who you think might be interested.
It’s amazing how much goes on in a seemingly benign spotted gum forest each season.
