“Preliminary results from collaborative research between the Australian National University and ACT government indicate there may be fewer gang-gangs in Canberra than was previously believed.” “While we consider the ACT to be a stronghold for the species, the gang-gang is probably one of the least understood parrots in Australia,” she said. The ACT environment minister, Rebecca Vassarotti, described the gang-gang as a “popular rascal” whose distinctive call was adored by the Canberra community. The ACT government will coordinate national recovery efforts after receiving funding from the federal government to establish a national working group. “With climate change only going to make things harder for this cold-climate bird, the government needs to step in and better protect this amazing bird and the native forests that provide essential nesting hollows in old growth trees.” “Even before the devastation of the 2019-20 fires, the species has been suffering immensely,” she said. Holly Parsons, the manager of BirdLife’s urban bird program, which includes a gang-gang cockatoo recovery project, said the organisation’s monitoring had shown steep declines in the species since the 1970s. Listing of the birds will mean developments likely to trigger a significant impact on the species must be assessed under national laws.īirdLife Australia said it was a welcome move, but the organisation was “devastated to see a bird beloved by so many people in so much trouble”. That decline was expected to continue because increased heatwaves and fire frequency as a result of the climate emergency were increasing pressure on the species across its range, with bushfires likely to reduce the amount of nesting habitat available to the birds. The bushfires affected 36% of the birds’ range, leading to an estimated further drop in numbers of 21%. The scientific committee wrote in draft advice last year that gang-gang populations had already declined by between 15% and 69% before the fires. The bird is one of several plants and animals that required assessment after the 2019-20 bushfire disaster a number of other species are also expected to be added to the threatened list. They are a common sight in Canberra, where they are often found in back yards in the inner suburbs and in nearby bushland reserves. The adult males are known for their distinctive red facial feathers. “But they do face the other pressures of climate change, a warming climate and loss of forest habitat.Gang-gangs are small, grey cockatoos found throughout south-eastern Australia. “An end to native logging in Otways points to signs of hope for the southwest population, there’s less of the factors that are pushing them to extinction in eastern Victoria and NSW. “You can see them in Anglesea and Lorne and they turn up in suburbs of Geelong,” he said. While the big population losses are occuring in the northern part of the birds range, the Otways’ population is comparatively stable, Sean Dooley said. The federal environment department lists climate change, wildfire, habitat loss and competition for suitable nesting hollows as adversely impacting the species.Ĭlimate change is heating the preferred cool climate forest habitat of the bird, which is also impacted by logging native forests, “the big old trees that have hollows”, Mr Dooley said. “Then the fires ripped through around 35 per cent of their habitat,” Mr Dooley said. The species “requires a complex suite of recovery and threat abatement actions across multiple state boundaries and involving a wide variety of land managers and other stakeholders”, the department stated.Ī decades long Birdlife Australia monitoring program had already picked up a massive drop in Gang-gang numbers prior to the 2019 bushfires, up to 70 per cent across the bird’s entire range. The listing came into effect on March 2 this year and came with a federal environment department warning that no formal plan currently exists to help the species recover its dwindling numbers. “Birdlife Australia had recommended an official listing as vulnerable, but the federal environment department of threatened species – the body that looks at this – have looked into the rates of decline that have alarmed them to the extent that they think the bird should be listed in the endangered category,” Birdlife Australia’s national public affairs manager Sean Dooley said. THE Gang-gang Cockatoo has been added to Australia’s list of threatened species, listed as endangered by the federal government.
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