The Wings on King Project was launched with a 3-day celebration of the Birds of King Island, at the end of April, 2017
‘Wings on King’ – Takes Flight
Wings on King is up, off and in full flight having been launched at the end of April 2017 with a mixture of learning, laughter, legging it and leisure!
Many thanks to all the wonderful people who gave us a hand; the visiting surveyors, speakers, the ground-crew who organised it all and the various local businesses who supported it. It was such fun.
While the weather wasn’t great, a fantastic weekend was had with visitors and islanders working together – learning from each other at many levels.
Surveys were undertaken on Forty sites as well as two special searches – one for Orange Bellied Parrots migrating back to the mainland and the other for the King Island subspecies of Scrubtit and Brown Thornbill. While none of these Critically Endangered Birds were sighted many others were including the Vulnerable King Island subspecies of Green Rosella and Black Currawong, with the least common but not listed, being a Lewin’s Rail.
All the speakers at the seminar and workshops gave excellent presentations – thought provoking as well as practical. See their profiles and abstracts.
Social events included a BBQ and Penguin watching walk at the Grassy Boat Club that resulted in some enthusiasts braving a chilly evening and walking to see the penguins while others remained sitting around the fire with a glass of wine hoping the penguins would come to them – which some duly did! A dinner at the local pub included a King Island Beef Farmer, James Hill, giving a delightfully insightful and funny talk about growing up on King Island and learning to love birds.
The Wings On King Seminar and Launch Presentation Summaries and Speaker profiles
Professor David Watson, Charles Sturt University
Seminar: “Boosting biodiversity AND the bottom-line—achieving win-win outcomes with conservation farming”
Workshop Leader: 'Defragging King Island.
Environmental protection and profitable agriculture have traditionally been regarded as mutually exclusive; any development to increase margins considered to necessarily diminish habitat values. I disagree, and a growing body of research and a long list of case studies demonstrates the exact opposite. With integrated management, careful planning and strategic investment, farming enterprises and biodiversity values both thrive, building on one another.
As well as stepping through several examples, I develop the concept of natural capital, demonstrating the fundamental importance of managing soils and water for ecosystem health and agricultural productivity. With a diversity of diets, nesting locations and other resource needs, woodland birds are a sensitive indicator of habitat quality. By considering individual farms and farming enterprises within an inter-connected landscape, I demonstrate how maximizing connectivity is essential to manage climate-change impacts, enhance ecosystem services and keep rural communities vibrant.
Dave is a Professor of Ecology at Charles Sturt University. His research falls into three principal areas: managing biodiversity in agricultural landscapes; measuring and predicting the biological effects of habitat fragmentation; and the ecology of parasitic plants. His research has been conducted through detailed community-level field studies in Australia and Latin America. Most of his research is applied, improving our understanding and management of natural systems.
Dr Richard Donaghey, Consultant Ecologist, Tasmania
“King Island – This unique Island” and Workshops ‘Identifying birds of King Island and ‘Threatened Species of King Island’
King Island is special and unique in terms of its landforms, lost fauna, past extensive wet eucalypt forest and present flora and fauna that reflect its western location, midway between Victoria and Tasmania. Islands such as Tasmania and King are important for the evolution of endemic species and subspecies and for future conservation action such as predator removal and reintroduction of threatened species. Compared to Tasmania King Island has a high number of bird species considering it lacks some major plant communities of western Tasmania and lacks some bird species of eastern Tasmania. An overview of King Island’s ten endemic birds and other special birds of forests, wetlands and beaches will be presented and their functional groups and habitat requirements discussed. The Golden-headed Cisticola is a very interesting small bird that breeds on King but not in Tasmania. King Island is an important stopover for migratory shorebirds, the Orange-bellied Parrot and for breeding passerines. Bird monitoring on King Island will provide a clearer picture of current bird distribution and their status in relation to habitat condition, breeding success and predator abundance, and provide future directions for conservation. Climate change will impact on bird habitat and their food, for example soil invertebrates. Landholders will continue to play a significant role in conservation. Examples of future conservation actions are given
Richard’s lifelong love of birds and plants began as a young boy growing up in Sydney. He studied Agricultural Science at Sydney Uni but after four amazing years in PNG immigrated to Canada, gained a MSc in Zoology studying Bufflehead behaviour and then studied the ecology and behaviour of bowerbirds for a PhD. I first went to King Island in 1997 as a Bushcare Extension Officer and have had a love affair with KI ever since. I edited and wrote most of ‘The Fauna of King Island’ and wrote a report on the KI Scrubtit. In ‘retirement’ for the past 15 years, I have studied parental care in Australasian robins and other birds throughout Australia and New Guinea.
Dr Kerryn Herman, BirdLife Australia
“Using Bird Data for Land Management” and survey team-leader
We can use the data gathered by to develop long-term trends/indicators of birds. I will present a summary of the survey effort currently available for King Island and (if data is available) run some trend models using the State of Australia's Birds method developed specifically to undertake long term trend analysis for indicators. If data is not available I will present what we CAN do when we have sufficient data, and how that information can be used in land management.
Kerryn is currently the Research and Conservation Officer for BirdLife Australia. With over 10 years experience in research and environmental management, Kerryn’s knowledge of Tasmanian biodiversity and ecology is complemented by practical experience of monitoring, evaluation and reporting. Kerryn has a great capacity to explain issues clearly and simply.
Neale Coutanche –Cowra Woodland Birds Project, NSW
Case Study: "Impacts of a bird monitoring project 15 years on...”
The members of the Cowra Woodland Birds Project have been carrying out quarterly surveys of bird populations within the Cowra Shire for the past 15 years. The 90 sites range from remnant woodland within National Parks to run down Travelling Stock Reserves, cypress/ironbark ridges to riparian patches on the banks of the Lachlan River and heavily grazed shelter belts to recently established revegetation projects.
Neale Coutanche, a local Agronomist, has been involved at both participant and organiser level since the early days of the project. His professional relationship with many of the local landholders has provided the group with a trusted local base from which to operate as well as giving the land-owners confidence in the aims and objectives of the birders working on their properties.
He will outline the early days setting up the project, what they do to keep the ever-widening range of stakeholders on-side, as well as revealing some data trends from the project and some of the strengths and weaknesses in the accumulated data set.
Neale is an Agronomist in Cowra, NSW, where he has been involved at both participant and organiser level since the early days of the Cowra Woodland Bird Project. His professional relationship with many of the local landholders has provided the group with a trusted local base from which to operate as well as giving the land-owners confidence in the aims and objectives of the birders working on their properties.
Andrew Silcocks – BirdLife Australia
Workshop: ‘How to monitor birds and use the BirdLife database’ and survey team-leader
The members of the Cowra Woodland Birds Project have been carrying out quarterly surveys of bird populations within the Cowra Shire for the past 15 years. The 90 sites range from remnant woodland within National Parks to run down Travelling Stock Reserves, cypress/ironbark ridges to riparian patches on the banks of the Lachlan River and heavily grazed shelter belts to recently established revegetation projects.
Kate Ravich – KINRMG Project Co-ordinator
About ‘WINGS ON KING’ – "a project to find and tell the story of the birds of King Island”
The Wings on King project is fundamentally about ‘sustainability.’ The data gathered will inform the King Island Natural Resource Management Group and through them the King Island Community of the overall environmental health of the island – that is it’s environmental sustainability. Simultaneously, it will contribute towards monitoring Australia’s environmental sustainability through BirdLife Australia’s Bird Indices. The increased visitors to King Island to gather the data i.e. monitor birds, will contribute positively to the economic sustainability of the island including indirectly to work opportunities and thus social sustainability. In this talk I will briefly discuss what we mean by ‘sustainability’ and will present the overall design and methods of the Wings on King project, its relevance and value to King Island.
Kate has lived, part-time, on King Island since 2004, owning a 500 acre covenanted forest in the north-east. She has been a Member of the King Island KINRMG since 2004 and became a member of its committee in 2013. Kate holds degrees in Adult Education (community) and in Ornithology. She joined BirdLife Australia in 1986 and since then has undertaken honorary work in a number of capacities including co-founding the Eureka prize-winning and on-going Birds in Backyards program in 1998 and serving as a Councillor (Director) from 2007-2012.
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