<
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/apr/07/from-blackening-skies-to-barely-casting-a-shadow-the-carnabys-cockatoo-faces-a-bleak-future>
"Less than a lifetime ago, great flocks of Carnaby’s cockatoos cast large
shadows over Perth. Now, the long-term clearing of eucalypt forests and banksia
woodlands, combined with southern Western Australia’s driest and hottest period
on record, is pushing the species towards extinction. Scientists say little is
being done to reverse the decline.
Peter Mawson, a research associate at Western Australia’s biodiversity
department, is old enough to remember a time when the birds were a common
sight. “Sometimes, I see people make comments on social media that they’ve seen
a flock of 100 Carnaby’s cockatoos and they’re really chuffed at that, because
normally you see them in 10s or 20s,” he said. “But when I was a small boy
collecting firewood with my father not far from where I grew up it was not
uncommon to see flocks of 3,000 to 5,000 birds fly overhead.
“Most people I talk to have never seen a flock of that size, just because
they’re not from my generation.”
Carnaby’s cockatoos are endemic to WA, living between Kalbarri on the mid-west
coast and Cape Arid in the south. Black with distinctive white cheeks and tail
bands, they live remarkably long lives – up to 35 years in the wild. Only a few
birds, including shearwaters and albatrosses, live longer.
Because the species matures late, produces few young and has a low survival
rate after first leaving the nest, its population fell quickly after old trees
with deep hollows suitable for nesting were destroyed to accommodate farming
and urban expansion in the decades after the 1950s. Invasive species and a
bounty on the birds until 1982 to protect pine plantations hastened their
decline. Numbers halved between 1963 and 2008 and the birds disappeared from a
third of the area in which they were once found. Mawson estimates the
population is now as low as 20,000.
The species’ health has weakened as warnings about the need to minimise threats
from forest clearing, invasive species and the spread of timber plantations
have largely been ignored."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
