17 August–6 September 2008
Location: Cape Arid National Park, south-east Western Australia
Perth Zoo Field Worker: Arthur Ferguson (Australian Fauna supervisor)
Goals
A Western Ground Parrot.
There are believed to be fewer than 140 Western Ground Parrots left in the wild in two or three national parks in Western Australia – Fitzgerald River, Cape Arid and possibly Waychinicup. The parrots were last heard in Waychinicup in 2003 and may no longer exist there.
The Western Ground Parrot Recovery Project, run by the Department of Environment and Conservation and funded by South Coast Natural Resource Management (NRM), was launched in October 2003. The goals of the project are to locate and monitor ground parrot populations and ensure the survival of this species.
The population monitoring in 2007 revealed a worrying trend with numbers declining. The priority for 2008 was to survey the known populations in Cape Arid and Fitzgerald River National Parks to find out how many birds remain.
My involvement included assisting with listening surveys, setting up and dismantling of mist nets and radio tracking with the aim of finding out more about the daily movements and breeding biology of the Western Ground Parrot.
Achievement
Western Ground Parrots fly to and from their roosting and feeding grounds at dawn and dusk so we set up mist nets along their flight path. On the first night, we caught a parrot in the net which was very exciting as this was the first Western Ground Parrot caught in 19 years.
Cape Arid.
The capture of this bird was extremely significant and gave researchers the opportunity to assess the bird’s general health, collect blood for important DNA work, take faecal swabs to check for any parasites and weigh and measure the bird.
A small transmitter weighing two grams was carefully attached to the bird’s tail feathers and a metal identification band was fitted to the bird’s leg. The next morning we released the bird and tracked it.
Highlights
Being able to see a Western Ground Parrot in the hand was a real highlight and of course being part of the first capture of this parrot in 19 years was pretty special.
Challenges
Western Ground Parrots are very cryptic. They fly very low and spend most of their time on the ground. They are superbly camouflaged and extremely difficult to observe in the field. In order to locate them and estimate their numbers, we needed to carry out listening surveys.
These surveys started an hour before dawn and after dusk and lasted for 50 minutes. The birds call before flying to their roosting site or feeding grounds at dawn and dusk so that was prime listening time. Unfortunately, lots of other animals call at the same time including other birds and frogs.
The frogs have a similar call to the begging call of the female ground parrot so it took a while to determine one from the other. I was given a CD of parrot calls before I went on the field trip to help me but it was still a challenge.
Attaching a radio transmitter.
Benefits
I find field work very rewarding. The opportunity to work beyond the borders of the Zoo is a fantastic initiative and is another element to our work that I think is really important.
It’s also good to get hands-on and contribute to conservation in another way. However, you have to be suited to working in remote areas with very basic facilities which isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and we did have to work 11-hour days at times so it’s not always easy.
Other Notes
I wasn’t the only one out there, of course. DEC staff with the Western Ground Parrot Recovery Project, Dr Abby Berryman and Jeff Pinder, as well as volunteers John Tucker and Jim Creighton were there as well.
Abby and Jeff have put in so much work to help save this bird from extinction and it’s not easy work. Their dedication, as well as that of the Friends of the Western Ground Parrot, South Coast Natural Resource Management, Birds Australia and other volunteers, is fantastic.
