|
Hi Birders,
I too would support Mike Carter about
the inaccuracies in the paper published in the The Emu recently, but there is
one aspect that i would disagree with Mike about! That relates to the status of
the Black Petrel in NSW. Mike says "...Black Petrel is so rare that Birds
Australia Rarities Committee must access sightings before acceptance..." when
discussing the claim that Buller's Shearwaters and Black Petrel are said to be
"common" by the authors of the paper.
The fact of the matter is that while
neither species is "common", both are regularly encountered in NSW offshore
waters in summer. In the NSW 1999 Annual Bird Report (2002
Birding NSW, A. Morris Editor) details are given of 26 Buller's Shearwaters
being seen offshore on pelagic trips or from seawatching from coastal sites on
at least 16 seperate occasions in 1999, while 24 Black Petrels were seen on 7
seperate pelagic trips from Sydney, Wollongong, Batemans Bay & Eden.
Borth species tend to be be seen from November to March. In the year 2000, both
species were seen in similar numbers and were also seen on the Swansea pelagic
trips as well. Obviously they are not "common" as compared to all the other
shearwaters and the more commonly petrels like White-headed, Great-winged &
Providence Petrels but they are not rare either. Black Petrels do hang around
the boat on the pelagic trips and good views are available and the bird
can be distinguished from the larger and rarer Westland Petrel.
At the risk of stirring up a hornets
nest, I say that for the Birds Australia Rarities Committee to insist that they
are so rare that a URRF is required would probably indicate that some members
are putting their heads in the sand, either that or they won't go on a NSW
pelagic trip in summer to see for themselves. All I know is that Black Petrels
are sufficiently common enough that no member of a pelagic trip considers
it worthwhile to complete a URRF form and the NSW Rarities Committee removed the
species from their Review List 5 years ago. So what is the problem with
BARC?
Alan Morris
Editor, NSW Annual Bird
Repot
| 