BAYBOCA Bulletern
Extract BAYBOCA Bulletern
ExtractThe following article is from the June 1999 edition of the BAYBOCA newsletter, the BAYBOCA Bulletern, which is mailed to all members.
While this is an appeal for help from BAYBOCA members, anyone with reasonable powers of observation and the ability to identify Superb Fairy-wrens would be welcome.
Here is a chance to enjoy yourselves and to help the emblem of BOCA by assisting in observing our local Blue Wrens (aka Superb Fairy-wren).
In 1996 Bayside Council commissioned a flora and fauna report. Part 2 - Fauna Survey and Management Guidelines was prepared by Chris Pavey of WBM Oceanics Australia. There was considerable input by local people personally, by correspondence, and from published articles and booklets. Nevertheless it was a shock, but not really surprising, to find that he determined the status of our beloved local Blue Wrens as locally endangered.
Then in 1998 when the Beach Road bike path was being made, a decision was made to make it more scenic by winding it through the bushland of Beach Park behind the Sandringham Football Ground. As this was one of the few strongholds of Blue Wrens the Friends of Native Wildlife were appalled as we felt that this would put extra pressure on our surviving birds, not to mention a few Blue-tongue Lizards who could possibly be run over. Many submissions were made by local environment groups to have the bike path routed beside Beach Road as had been originally planned, because it was felt that there would be too much disturbance to flora as well as fauna.
During the spirited and sometimes acrimonious debate which followed, one individual shouted at a Council meeting that Blue Wrens appeared to have more rights than residents!
Eventually by a narrow margin Council voted to put the bike path beside Beach Road. After all the fuss that Friends of Native Wildlife and others had made we felt that we should follow it up with some constructive efforts on behalf of our Blue Wrens.
Over the years pressure of housing development with
attendant domestic animals and loss of understorey has driven
them into parts of Beach Park. Only three or four family groups
(12 to 14 birds) survive inland at the Bay Road Heathland. We
have lost the birds from the golf courses, possibly because of
feral cats and toxic sprays which were used in the Sixties, but
gone they are.
Friends of Native Wildlife want to determine where the birds are, how many there are, and what breeding success they are having.
Because Beach Park is a linear park most of it can be observed by allotting a single section to a single observer, for example my area is Ricketts Point/Watkins Bay, Ian Parsons does part of Sandringham as does Charles Smith.
However, to be accurate in a large area such as that between Hampton Gardens and Sandringham Life-saving Club we need teams of observers doing a specific area simultaneously as was done in the BOCA Blue Wren surveys at Royal Botanical Gardens of Melbourne.
And this is where Friends of Native Wildlife need the help of BAYBOCA. The two groups have successfully collaborated before in the provision and design of the two birding signs at Ricketts Point.
Friends of Native Wildlife have obtained written permission from Harper Collins Publishers to reproduce the Blue Wren illustration and text from the Graham Pizzey and Frank Knight Field Guide to the Birds of Australia to make a fact sheet which we hope will assist observers.
We have been assisted by Amy Weir the Environment Research Officer for Bayside City Council who has reproduced our fact sheets for us. Incidentally she has been involved in personally removing feral cats from Beach Park and is most supportive of our endeavours and awaits any recommendations.
What do we need?We need people to help with the surveys and preferably to do the same area each time as that way you would get to know your Wren family and their territories.
We also need people to adopt a patch of Beach Park for close observation.
Breeding will probably have finished, but juvenile birds with half grown tails may still be seen begging for food. Breeding males may be commencing their moult into brown plumage.
Some males may be back in breeding plumage, others still moulting back in. Juvenile males should have blue tails now.
Male birds in nuptial plumage will be establishing their territory by song or skirmish. Solitary dispersing females may be seen.
Breeding should be under way. Food may be carried into dense thickets, high-pitched calling of nestlings may be heard, fledgling with half-grown tails may be seen hiding in thickets.
Specifically we hope to observe where the birds are and their breeding success or failure. We will note which plants and sites are preferred for nesting. We will observe which plants are important for feeding, for example Coast Daisy-Bush Olearia axillaris attracts many small insects.
We shall compile our results into a concise form for the use of Friends groups for their plantings and for the use of any interested persons.
Contact people Michael Norris 9598 3092 or 9521 6879
Moira Longden 9589 2725.
Saturdays, 19 June, 18 September, 11 December. Meet at the Picnic Point car park reached by Jetty Road which overlooks the sea before the turn past the Yacht Club Melway 76 E8. Meet at 8:30 am.
There will also be surveys at the Jim Willis Reserve (Brighton Dunes) on Saturdays 17 July, 16 October, and 19 February 2000, meeting at 8:30 am at the north end of the Green Point/Brighton Beach Gardens car park Melway 76 C2.
Friends of Native Wildlife will welcome any assistance we may receive from BAYBOCA. Hope to see some of you there.
Credits
Article: Moira Longden
Photograph: Tania Ireton
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