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Thanks to Hugo and David for your advice
regarding the abandonment of all the nests in a Fairy Martin colony near Dubbo
in central NSW.
The property owners have now found a
couple of dead adults at the edge of their property. The whole story is
that the flock gradually became fewer in number, with less birds returning each
day to feed the chicks. Then, no birds at all. After a couple of
weeks (?) a bad smell caused the property owners to knock down the
abandoned nests. They found 10-15 dead, fully-feathered chicks, and a few
live ones. WIRES was called in to try to save the living but weak
chicks. Unfortunately, they have all died since I first wrote about
this.
It could be that a nearby property had
sprayed a chemical that affected the adults gradually - maybe an insecticide? My
information is that this would have been 4-5 kms away.
Judie
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