'Wings on King' takes flight: Registrations now open.
We have fantastic speakers for the Wings on King project launch
We hope you will come along and hear what they have to say
Professor David Watson; Dr Richard Donaghey;
Dr Kerryn Herman and others…
REGISTER AND BOOK EARLY.
ACCOMODATION AND CAR HIRE ON KING ISLAND ARE LIMITED
There’s something for everyone – and its practical ‘how to’ :
identify and monitor birds; keep the common birds common and the threatened species from going extinct
To see the complete launch program including presentation summaries and/or to register for the launch go to: https://www.birdsofkingisland.com/launch-2017
SEMINAR OVERVIEW:
A Land Management focus:
Bird conservation on King Island encompasses two issues that are much the same worldwide: How do we keep the common species common and how do we prevent the already threatened species from becoming extinct while maintaining a healthy economy and social structure?
The focus of the half-day seminar, entitled “The Vital Role of Birds in the Landscape” is on the conservation of birds through good land management, using birds as indicators of how well the land, and in our case the whole island, is achieving that elusive sustainability goal.
How we manage our threatened species is also an important part of achieving sustainability and an essential element of ‘the clean green’ image that King Island is known for. It is also how a land management issue. How we can achieve these goals of sustainability environmentally, economically and socially will be discussed in the Saturday seminar, with a more in-depth focus in two afternoon workshops.
Managing the Threatened Species of King Island:
There are a number of birds that either live or utilise King Island that are classified as threatened. They include four of the six King Island subspecies being the King Island Scrubtit, Brown Thornbill, Black Currawong and Green Rosella. The other two King Island subspecies, Dusky Robin and Yellow Wattlebird, appear to still be in the fairly common range.
Re-finding the King Island Brown Thornbill:
The great news of 2016 was the successful and independent photographing by both Adrian Boyle and Dion Hobcroft, of the Critically Endangered KI Brown Thornbill. Prior to these we only had the very occasional observation of what the observer thought was probably a KI Brown Thornbill. We now know that they are not only still in existence but may be more widespread than we had previously thought. We need to determine what their status actually is before we can start work on a Recovery Plan.
Recovering the King Island Scrubtit
In 2007 a massive wildfire burnt the majority of the then known remaining habitat of the Critically Endangered KI Scrubtit - potentially its death knell. What habitat was left was in small, isolated clumps.. Since then, extensive searches undertaken by Richard Donaghey, Matt Webb and Mark Holdsworth have found small populations at two other sites. King Island Scrubtit Photo by Adrian Boyle
This is great news. The first stages of formulating a Recovery Plan for this species have now begun.
GIVING US A HAND
With a population of around 1300, there are few people on King Island with the time or the skills to collect the data that will allow us to manage the island effectively. So WE NEED HELP.
We hope that bird enthusiasts from across Australia and internationally, will come and help us by taking part in the Wings on King Project. You will be warmly welcomed.
To see the complete launch program including speaker abstracts and/or to register for the launch go to:
https://www.birdsofkingisland.com/launch-2017
To Register for the Wings on King project go to:
