I have an issue with someone on my street (or cul-de-sac) feeding magpies. As a result, I currently have over 20+ young males causing a nuisance and constantly looking for food.
This will be the first summer in four years that there will be no fairy wrens in my neighborhood. I've also lost brown honeyeaters, blue faced honeyeaters, doves and even lorikeets due to this excessive magpie problem.
My question is, how do I get all these magpies to leave? Can the council help here? ...Is there anyway I can even fix this problem?
I'm very upset that the fairy wrens have moved on (or were eaten) as my house was in their main breeding/feeding area.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Cheers
Such a shame, toggle. Sadly, you are witnessing what is happening across the length & breadth of our great nation, namely, the demise of so many native species through the thoughtless behaviour of so many Australians. So self-absorbed have so many people become that they are unable to see the connections between things, especially in the natural environment. This is severely exacerbated by people becoming divorced from the natural environment so addicted are they to artificiality.
I’m not at all hopeful that your council would be willing to intervene but as a start your might want to see if your council has an environment officer with whom you could discuss what you’ve observed. However, I suggest your only hope is to try to start a dialogue with your neighbour to enable him/her to appreciate the non-magpie birds in your neighbourhood & how these might be attracted to the area by, among other things, ceasing artificial feeding of the magpies. Are there any other native bird appreciating neighbours who might already have a good relationship with the offending feeder of Magpies & who might be able to have a word in her/his shell-like ear?
Years ago I wrote a monthly environmental newsletter which I distributed to about 40 letter boxes in my locality. I like to think this played a part in the extensive revegetation of many properties & the subsequent appearance of many native bird species which hadn’t been seen for decades. Is this something like you’d be prepared to do?
In short, the task is long & requires great stickability. There are no quick fixes but the sooner you start the sooner positive things are likely to happen.
Other Birds in Backyarders may have other ideas.