Hi Everyone,
At present I am involved in a small shorebird project spanning 18 months,
with two survey days per season, and we are halfway through it. We are
establishing the shorebird and tern use of the Noosa River estuary, and
evaluating the degree of disturbance to shorebirds in that area. The
following lists the species seen and numbers by tide, as well as an evening
tern survey. We were in the estuary from 9.30am until last light at 5.50pm.
The estuary is not important for large numbers of migratory shorebirds, but
we have had as many as 38,500 migratory terns during the summer season.
In short, we found on Sunday that there are migratory shorebirds using the
estuary for overwintering, whilst their colleagues are busy in the breeding
grounds. Pacific Golden Plovers are amongst them, which means that the
saltmarsh habitat on the little sand island near the Frying Pan is important
to migratory shorebirds throughout the year, and not just in the summer.
During the summer we found that the saltmarsh is used on each high tide by
Pacific Golden Plovers and Sharp-tailed Sandpipers. We found plenty of
resident Crested Terns using the estuary, which is consistent with our
Caloundra experiences for this time of year. There were, of course, no
migratory terns present. Of interest is the number of Sacred Kingfishers
(no, not Mangrove Kingfishers, and we didn't hear one call all day) present
on the sandbanks. They were seen on both the high and the low tides because
the tide was in neap phase. If the tide had been in flood phase, we would
only have seen them on the low tide.
Below is a list of the birds observed and the numbers seen on which tides.
25.6.06 HIGH TIDE LOW TIDE EVENING SURVEY
SPECIES ESTUARY TOTAL ESTUARY TOTAL NOOSA SPIT
Caspian Tern 3 1
Crested Tern 1588 714 1109
Gull-billed Tern 3 6
Silver Gull 41 26 45
Whimbrel 7 10
Bar-tailed Godwit 27 38
Red-necked Stint 18 10
Grey-tailed Tattler 2 0
Masked Lapwing 0 2
Red-capped Plover 33 24
Double-banded Plover 34 32
Pacific Golden Plover 8 12
Pied Oystercatcher 4 0
Australian Pelican 17 31
Pied Cormorant 60 15 2
White-faced Heron 1 1
Egret spp 3 3
Whistling Kite 2 0
Brahminy Kite 0 1
Osprey 0 1
White-bellied Sea-Eagle 2 0
Sacred Kingfisher 5 10
TOTAL: 1858 937 1156
NO. OF SPECIES 19 18 3
I hope this formatting holds for your easier viewing.
Cheers,
Jill
===============================
www.birding-aus.org
birding-aus.blogspot.com
To unsubscribe from this mailing list,
send the message:
unsubscribe
(in the body of the message, with no Subject line)
to:
===============================
|
