Hi all,
You may remember I've been doing research on shoreline-nesting birds at
the Mt William National Park in Tasmania. Well, I'm back in good old
Melbourne and thought you'd be interested in how the research went.
I found and monitored 160 nests along about 20 km of beach. Most of the
nests were of the Hooded Plover and Pied Oystercatcher. There were also
a few Red-capped Plovers, Fairy terns, Sooty Oystercatchers and Masked
Lapwings. I'm about to tackle the analysis of the data, but so far I can
tell you that predation was by far the most common cause of nest
failure, accounting for approximately 80% of nests. The birds seemed to
be able to cope with this though, with some pairs renesting up to four
times. Forest Ravens appeared to be the most common predator. Plover
chicks are very cute.
On another note, if you're ever in the area of north-east Tasmania I
suggest the Mt William National Park is well worth a visit. It's a long
way off the beaten track, but the good thing is this means very few
people around. I did notice that there were a lot more species around in
winter than there were in summer.
Cheers,
Lainie Berry (not the bowerbird person!)
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send the message
"unsubscribe birding-aus" (no quotes, no Subject line)
to
|
