Would anyone be aware of research into Noisy Miner (Manorina melanocephala) warning calls and Raptor hunting success. With dramatic population increases in Noisy miners, pretty much everywhere in S.E. Aust., this kind of research is very much topical....
Hi thyl - moved this into the general section.
Havent heard of anything. Noisy Miners are territorial - really I think the only way we are going to limit their impact is to change our habitat - providing something they don't like. There was some research a few years back that found that where bush corridors had bipinnate wattles in the canopy (as opposed to just Eucs) - there were less Noisy Miners and the highest bird diversity.
Clearly, human destruction of original habitats has advantaged some species, e.g., noisy miners, & disadvantaged most others. I'd be in favour of restoring, as far as possible, original habitats so that the disadvantaged can be more advantaged.
Love your point Woko, (but you knew that?), to give an idea what difference the right habitat makes, where I live is some original bush left, with hardly any interference of the owners. Some State Park, with a fair bit of interference like burns and slashing. (for unknown reasons to me). The impact it has on birdlife is obvious if you bother to look. I have a rich veriety of birds next to the "unmanaged" property, the State Park , well managed as some (not me) would say,has less native birds but still a lot of wildlife. But just 2 km down the road where some suburban housing estates are, you find countless " noisy miners". That gives you an indication of what needs to be done!?
M-L
I think Woko said in an earlier post that a "middle layer" or understorey is needed to limit the efficiency of noisy miners in keeping away smaller competitors from their patch. I believe that. Its probably more difficult for the miners to spot "intruders" and more difficult to swoop them in the understorey. Having said that, I think noisy miners are amazing, clever birds. They have great aeronautic and acrobatic skills and from my observation are selective in what other species they try to deter. I have seen both noisy miners and butcher birds together in my birdbath, the latter obviously recognised as not being a threat to the miners' nectar stores.
Thanks ALL for the feedback(my first post as a newbie to BIBY). Hey Night Parrot, you are right in saying that Noisy Miners are extremely intelligent. Very concerning though when smaller insectivorous species are excluded from habitat due to their hyperaggression. Have seen some local dieback of Euc's. possibly linked to absence of pardalote's and sittellas in Eastern Adelaide.
The role of backyard veg. in corridor maintenance and the loss of same due to urban infill is a hugely pressing issue which local planning authorities MUST address.
thylacaleo, S.A.
Yes, indeed, thyl. As I've previously posted, it grieves me when developers, with the connivance of governments, vanadalise the natural vegetation & then replace it with feral vegetation from outside the local area. Most of it comes from overseas & suggests that many Australians place a very low value on their country's natural environment. It will all come back to bite us in the derriere as our biodiversity disappears under tar & cement.
Thanks Woko, need more people with the guts to speak up about this. Have you read Tony hall's " The Life and death of the Australian backyard"? Looks at the issue of veg. loss in the burbs and subsequent biodiversity loss. We need legislation, unfortunately, that protects "greenspace" at that level (the backyard that is). Housing footprints have grown over time leaving little backyard space for veg.
The rampant infill at developers hands needs some constraint. In Adelaide, Govt. wants another 580,000 people within the Greater Adelaide region by 2036 , a lot of this achieved by infill and urban consolidation. The scenario is a scary one for urban bird species and I have already noticed reductions in quite ubiquitous birds like white plumed honeyeaters, Little wattlebirds and the like.
Too many people always equates to biodiversity loss...
thylacaleo, S.A.
No, I haven't read that one, thyl, but I'll put it on my books to buy list. I find it an amazing phenomenon of our times that in spite of all that's written & spoken about habitat & biodiversity loss & what that means for Australia, politicians still collude with developers in the destruction of Australia. There are occasional wins but the trend is still very much downwards. I can't see how politicians & developers can justifiably criticise young people for vandalising building sites when pollies & developers are up to their necks in environmentcide.
On my farm we don't get noisy miners, though there are some nearby. When there is a good diversity of birds you get a territorial division even between the different species. Birds in towns don't seem to defend territories the same way. I have been on my place 18 years now, and the areas the different species occupy remain fairly static. There is some change in concentrations and distribution, but the noisy miners seem to confine themselves to their area, as do the other birds. I know noisy miners cause problems in some bush areas, maybe there has been disturbance from logging to break up territories.
Interesting observations, Greg. I've noticed that noisy miners are prevelant in open woodlands where there is little understorey. Would this be the case where you live?
You're right, woko, they do live in open woodland. However there is a lot of woodland but they only live in one area which has stayed static for years. The magpies often seem to act as the local "police", harassing any medium/large birds that try to move in on the magpies territory. I think the interaction between the different bird species is very complex, but they do interact to share and defend territories.
Hey Woko, Greg, I've been looking at a comparison of 2 urban sites in Adelaide(both in the "leafy" East and West, which has experienced a lot of urban infill for the last 10 years or so). Noisy miner pop. densities are far greater, by an order of magnitude, in the West where veg. % cover of plants (native or non-native) < 3m strata. The East still has a lot of older, denser gardens and supports a lot of taxa that are locally extinct in the West. The Noisy miners probably have quite a bit to do with that,but habitat loss has provided the Miner with the edge-type habitat that it thrives in, the Western suburbs are becoming an Avian monoculture to some degree as a result...Both native and non-native plants in backyards are especially important, particularly within that strata, so preservation of these "older" green gardens is especially important for bird diversity and reducing noisy miner pops....Thylacaleo...
thylacaleo, S.A.
Most interesting, Greg. The divying up of woodland areas by different bird species would be an interesting research topic.
And most interesting, too, thyl. I guess what you're saying is that, regardless of vegetation species, an important factor in bird species diversity is diversity of vegetation structure. Quite fascinating.
Hey Woko, an interesting aside to the Noisy miner discussion, do you know much about whats happening to Darwins Finches in the Galapagos and the parasitic fly that preys on nestlings? The fly lays its eggs in the nests of mainly the ground finches and the larva feed on the newly hatched young, attacking the sinus of the hatchling. If the young survive, quite often the nasal cavity is consumed by fly larvae to such an extent that it is changing the "song' of the growing bird. As young males copy the songs of their fathers, this is having a dramatic effect on breeding success of young adult males.
As a response to the fly, which seeks out high densities of nesting finches, the finches are being found to nest at increasing distances from their nesting counterparts, possibly to reduce the impact of the fly. Evolution in the blink of an eye...Thylacaleo...
thylacaleo, S.A.
Hi thyl. No, I hadn't heard about the finches & the parasitic flies in the Galagagos but I had read that evolution in isolated locations can occur quite quickly. I think it was Richard Dawkins who wrote about it. Anyway, it's most, most interesting. I wonder what the long term effects will be on the finch population & whether something will evolve to use the fly larvae. Perhaps the parent finches will get wise to another food source.
Not aware of any research but from my own observation Noisy Miners will send out warning calls not only in the presence of a bird of prey, but if any strange bird to their territory arrives ie cormorant, pelican etc. To me they are an edgy bird. I have imitated their warning call and the miners duck for cover too and look around for danger so I believe that Noisy Miners have no effect on the hunting success of raptors, to me they just seem to be like a rowdy bunch of school boys! Usually when raptors are sighted it is when they are just flying through not worried about being seen. Of course this is just my observation.
See it! Hear it!
Mid-North Coast NSW