Ken Maling wrote:
> However this year we have an absolute plague of Blackbirds which seem to
> have reduced numbers of fantails, finches and wrens. Mynahs had almost
> entirely replaced Miners but now even the Mynahs are being driven off by
> Blackbirds.
>
> How do we keep numbers of introduced species down?
>
>
The only practical way seems to be what Bett Mitchell is doing on her
property, planting lots of native trees to make the environment as conducive
as possible to the return of native birds. Apart from that we might just
have to tolerate a number of introduced species.
I notice in our small suburban garden (Burwood, Vic) that we have far more
native birds than our neighbours. Our garden is packed full of plants,
mostly native, of all different sizes, with "lawn" kept to a minimum. When
we moved in over 20 years ago we systematically started to replace exotic
plants with natives.
In the early days there were millions of starlings, as well as sparrows,
black birds, mynahs, and turtle-doves. There are still a few blackbirds
that dig around in the mulch, but the others now restrict themselves to the
neighbours' gardens that are traditional with small exotic plants and nice
manicured lawns.
We have lots of wattlebirds, white-plumed honeyeaters, and thornbills, with
occasional silvereyes, eastern spinebills, musk and rainbow lorikeets, and
eastern rosellas. Magpies and ravens have lived in the area for a long
time, and butcherbirds are relative newcomers. This might not sound like
much, but it's only a little garden surrounded by non-native gardens.
Merrilyn.
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