Month: August 2012

Legal Immigrants

Heard my first Oriole of the season yesterday and the first Leaden Flycatcher the day before. Also, the first Scarlet Honeyeater in my garden since April on the 24th.

Paul Osborn Bulahdelah, NSW ===============================

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Native Landscaping in Urban Areas Can Help Native Birds

Synopsis at http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120822184134.htm

Article at

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0043497

Linking Foraging Decisions to Residential Yard Bird Composition Susannah B. Lerman1ยค*, Paige S. Warren2, Hilary Gan3,Eyal Shochat3,4

Urban bird communities have higher densities but lower diversity compared with wildlands. However, recent studies show that residential urban yards with native plantings have higher native bird diversity compared with yards with exotic vegetation. Here we tested whether landscape designs also affect bird foraging behavior. We estimated foraging decisions by measuring the giving-up densities (GUD; amount of food resources remaining when the final forager quits foraging on an artificial food patch, i.e seed trays) in residential yards in Phoenix, AZ, USA. We assessed how two yard designs (mesic: lush, exotic vegetation; xeric: drought-tolerant and native vegetation) differed in foraging costs. Further, we developed a statistical model to calculate GUDs for every species visiting the seed tray. Birds foraging in mesic yards depleted seed trays to a lower level (i.e. had lower GUDs) compared to birds foraging in xeric yards. After accounting for bird densities, the lower GUDs in mesic yards appeared largely driven by invasive and synanthropic species. Furthermore, behavioral responses of individual species were affected by yard design. Species visiting trays in both yard designs had lower GUDs in mesic yards. Differences in resource abundance (i.e., alternative resources more abundant and of higher quality in xeric yards) contributed to our results, while predation costs associated with foraging did not. By enhancing the GUD, a common method for assessing the costs associated with foraging, our statistical model provided insights into how individual species and bird densities influenced the GUD. These differences we found in foraging behavior were indicative of differences in habitat quality, and thus our study lends additional support for native landscapes to help reverse the loss of urban bird diversity. ===============================

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Sunshine Coast pelagic

We’ve got a couple of spots left for our next pelagic off the Sunshine Coast on Saturday, October 6. Please let me know if you are interested.

The cost as usual is $120 per person. Our cost is a little higher than average because of the twin, large motors on the catamaran that allows us to get out to the shelf in the relatively quick of time of between 1.5 and 2 hours, depending on the wind.

October could be an interesting time to be out there.

Greg Roberts

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Birds-of-paradise

Gidday Everyone

I have just returned from a trip to PNG which started off at Bensbach Wildlife Lodge with a group of mates who head there every year to fish for huge Barramundi, I managed to photograph Spangled Kookaburra which is virtually endemic to that region as well as distant shots of Glossy-mantled Manucode also Rufous-bellied Kookaburra and White-winged Fairywren but alas even though we tried for half a day we had no luck with the Fly River Grassbird but found a Masked Owl Ssp calabyii in a tree on the river. From there we Flew up to Lake Murray which is the biggest freshwater lake that I have ever seen and Trans New Guinea Tours are building a new lodge here and from what I saw of the area should make a great birding spot. We dropped a couple of blokes off who were going to search the lake for Black Bass one of the hardest fish to catch on rod & reel. From there we went to Tari and spent the night at Ambua Lodge and with the help of Joesph Tano I was able to photograph Short-tailed Paradigalla and Female BOP before flying into Mt Hagen and up to Rondon Ridge where I spent 8 days trying to photograph BOP and others. Some of the trails are extremely tough as I can attest to by the couple of times I sat down on my backside unintentionally and muddy hiking boots wet socks and shortness of breath for the 3 times that I went up onto the top of the ridge. But the birding was extremely rewarding seeing Orange-crowned Fairywren, Black Sicklebill, King-Bird-Of-Saxony, Wattled Ploughbill, Lesser Ground Robin and Brown Sicklebill. There were a couple of fruiting trees not far from the lodge and it was here that I obtained reasonable photographs of Superb BOP and Princess Stephanie’s Astrapia. This has been my second serious sojourn to PNG to try and photograph the birds that live there and it is one of the most difficult yet rewarding places that I have been and as long as I can put one foot in front of another I will continue to go back and chase some of those elusive birds. Here is my usual link to a couple of BOP’s that I have shot as well as a couple of photos of Spotted Whistling Duck on the Bensbach River

http://barraimaging.com.au/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=lastup

Kindest Regards

Geoff Jones

Website www.barraimaging.com.au

Slideshows http://barraimaging.smugmug.com/

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Centennial Park musk ducks

Hi Sydney birders

I remember seeing musk ducks some years ago on a club outing but I wondered if any have been seen recently at Centennial Park in Sydney? I have a friend keen to see some.

Thanks,

Chris ===============================

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Tree identification please

G’day all

I’m exploring a few places in Google Earth for a trip to North Queensland next month.

In street view at the entrance to the Cairns Botanical Gardens in Collins Avenue (-16.898749, 145.747651) there are two tall skinny trees. If anyone knows what they are I’d be most grateful. This tree is a common sight as a planted street tree in Tanzanian cities and towns and I never did find out what it was. Maybe it’s an Australian native. They certainly like our Eucalypts, Casuarinas and Silky Oaks.

Cheers Steve

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Two new Owl species and Five Owl upgrades for the Phillipines

Dear B-A,

An item from The Guardian online edition on two new Owl species described and five Owl sub-sp elevated to species in the Phillipines.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/grrlscientist/2012/aug/24/1

Cheers,

Carl Clifford ===============================

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