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About a week ago I asked for information on Quail Thrush in
the Uluru area for the purposes of ensuring the accuracy of an anecdote in my
upcoming comedy festival show about birdwatching.
I had several replies which were very informative and I
thought I would summarise them here.
Firstly from the atlas records submitted so far for the area,
there have been no records of any species of Quail Thrush. A worrying result,
but given the secretive nature of the genus, there is hope that they are still
present in the region, and they haven't gone the way of Mallee Fowl in the
Northern Territory.
Chestnut Quial Thrush is on the list and probably the most
likely species to be encountered, particularly in the more scrubby, thickly
vegeteated areas.
Both Cinnamon and Chestnut-breasted are on the list for the
park, but this probably can be accounted for by the fact that the Park list was
begun before the two species were split out. According to Hanzab and other
sources, it is Chestnut-breasted that is likely to be here, although no-one that
contcated me had seen it themselves. The nearest record of Cinnamon was in the
general vicinity mentioned in the Thomas and Thomas book, ie the Erldunda region
along the Stuart Highway which is approximately 250 km east of Uluru itself. I
imagine that is quite a small distance for the species to intergrate, although
perhaps it is similar to the gap between the range of the two Wedgebill
species?
What this exercise clearly demonstrates is the need to
identify where possible birds to the race level. Not only may they be split
out at some future date, but more importantly different races of the same
species may have different habitat preference, food sources, breeding
requirements etc which may be crucial to their status. If we lump all races
together when considering their conservation needs we may well be consigning one
of the populations to extinction through complacency.
For instance, if we were to consider the conservation status
of the Crested Shrike-tit as a whole species, we may come to the conclusion that
it is reasonably secure. Yet it is quite possible that the northern race
whitei may turn out to be one of our most critically endangered
passerine species.
Food for thought. And all this just from my desire to write a
joke.
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