good afternoon everyone and welcome as we explore the conservation project
making central inland glossies great again presented by local land services national parks and wildlife service and
the forestry corporation of new south wales i'm belinda hanley from the external communications team at the
department of planning and environment and i'll be your host today as we meet together virtually across the
state we each stand on the lands of many different nations and i acknowledge the traditional custodians and their ongoing
connection to land water air and community joining me first up today is libby
mcintyre project officer with local land services libya has worked in natural resource management for over 30 years
and most recently in the world of birds and their conservation i'm now delighted to hand over to you libby
hello everyone it's libby mcintyre speaking welcome to
today's presentation making central inland glossies great again thanks for belinder
for being our host i'm on radgery country today in dubbo and i would like to acknowledge the
traditional custodians of the lands on which we meet today i would also like to pay my respects to
elders past present and emerging and extend that respect to all aboriginal people present today
so welcome to today's webinar our agenda today covers these specific
topics and we hope you enjoy the presentations so i'm just going to give you a little bit of an overview about
the project laura douglas will speak about glossy identification and habitat
adam fawcett will talk about the annual glossy count and pat dr pat will talk about
technology that we are using throughout this project toward the end if you uh if you have any
questions throughout the presentation please um put those into the into the public chat as belinda have have said
and what we'll also do is to put our email addresses for the four presenters in the chat if you would like any
further information from us so making central inland gloss is great
again this is a seven year project and is funded by the new south wales
environmental trust saving our species program it is a collaborative partnership with
local land services the new south wales national parks and wildlife service forestry corporation of new south wales
the dubo field naturalists and conservation society the department of planning and environment the australian
wildlife conservancy plus our enthusiastic working team from across these groups
the project aims to carry out a wide range of activities over that period of time to promote and implement
conservation activities within the central west region we are currently in the third year of
the seven year project and in the initial phase of the project we have focused on identifying priority
habitats undertaking surveys to monitor the populations and raising awareness about the species
and its associated habitat within targeted areas a priority foraging and breeding habitat
map has been developed to ensure the work carried out throughout the project will be within the highest priority
areas surveillance cameras and song meters have been deployed in the piliga and gnu
to measure the presence and populations of glossies along with feral and native animal populations
a large-scale annual citizen science project which includes the inland glossy count
surveys glossy numbers annually combined with a number of field days and training workshops
ultimately the aim of the project is to use the data and research collected to
advise both public and private land managers for the glossy blacks and how to protect
and enhance breeding and habitat foraging areas with the aim to increase population
numbers threats to the glossy black cockatoo include clearing of specialized
vegetation that the glossy feeds on decline of hollow-bearing trees for
nesting due to clearing fire and age which affects those old trees
competition from feral herbivores and stock foraging on a la cash arenas loss
of water sources drought disturbance from mining activities weed infestation and sadly illegal
poaching of eggs and birds
on this slide you can see uh the the map of the three major areas that we are
working on and that includes pilligan national park um to the north
and that includes the forestry corporation area and land also managed by the australian wildlife conservancy
as we come a bit further south towards dubbo this is the gnu national park and
associated conservation reserves we head down further south towards parks
and this long skinny park is gu bang national park
we have private land holders who are adjacent to these areas have been invited to partake in our annual glossy
black counts and also be part of training workshops and this
late last year land holders in these priority areas could apply for funding
opportunities to help them improve the habitat for the glossy black the green areas if you're wondering in the map
are ala casuarina which is the preferred species by the glossy black
some of the activities that we will be carrying out on this particular project the annual black glossy counts
which adam will talk to about shortly and this year we're hoping for dry weather until the end of february so we
can access these sites without getting bogged we are keen to see how the numbers are
across these three areas it's important to involve the community in these events for them to gain skills
in identifying glossies and knowledge of how to be an integral part of the counts that we conduct
we have carried out a range of community engagement events which are listed there including glossies and gelato bird
watching in the pilliger which was very popular the get to know the glossy black
cockatoo with central west loch landcare glossies in the canoe with dr matt
cameron and this webinar which you are attending today
some of the activities that we are actually doing on ground will include
a little bit that pat will touch about a bit later in his presentation we will be monitoring water point
condition and further analyze the priority vegetation map and the suitability of
the habitat and condition for glossies the project will also be revamping and
monitoring 130 existing nest boxes and possibly installing
other types of hollows across the reserves this year on-ground activities will be
carried out with private land holders and will include wheat and pest animal control
strategic re-vegetation with important foraging and habitat species and possibly some nest hollow
augmentation thank you for the introduction libby i'd now like to introduce adam fawcett
project officer with threatened species national parks and wildlife service over to you adam
thanks very much for that belinda uh my name's adam fawcett and i'm the project office of threatened species for
the new south wales national parks and wildlife service and i've been doing land management on wildlife for many
years and i'm going to talk about the great inland glossy count today so
what i'll run through is just why we undertake the count scope of the count for the project how it fits into the
broader project that libby's just outlined results for the last two years the how the what and the where of the
gradient land glossy can itself how it all goes how you can register and what you need
to bring in the things you need to bear in mind during the count the counts for the inland population of the
glossy black cockatoo have been happening for some time the dubbo field naturalist and conservation society have
been undertaking biennial counts in gnu since about 1995.
and the dubbo field that's one of our project partners on this broader project account was also run in the peliga in
2014 as a collaboration between the pelican bird watchers and the new south wales national parks and wildlife
service but the gooban national park area has not had a count it's never had the same sort of broad scale glossy
black cockatoo counts and so all the information we're collecting there and all the work we're doing is all brand new it's basically
starting from scratch and these counts provide valuable information on the status of the
populations as a snapshot in time and then we can use that information to
monitor for changes in the population and plan management actions along the
lines of including tree planting for habitat as well food and and
future nest trees habitat protection from things like weeds and other things
fire management which can take out the allocation arenas particularly and also affect hollow bearing trees
competition with other species particularly for nesting sites with other cockatoo species protection of
nests from predation and other actions as well so those are some of the management actions we can do this there's a few others
and that will help us maintain the population overall in terms of what the counts aim to do we're aiming to survey
all three target areas so that's the piliga forest gnu and the goo bang area
at roughly the same time doing the count at roughly the same time should give us an independent population
estimate but given the logistics between the distance between those three sites and the number of sampling points that
we're looking at running them on the same weekend hasn't been something we've been able to manage
so they are being done spread apart from a week apart but that should give us
a good enough indication of the number of animals there will be a little bit of overlap but we've taken that into
account in terms of double counting and those sorts of things the counts are centered on those three
large areas of crown lands however it's not restricted to just the crown land itself it can occur on the surrounding
area on private property and other tenures so it's not just the crown lands we're interested in and given that the area of
the sites the counts are focused on water points and the reason we do this is because the glossy black cockatoos
are being observed to regularly come down and drink they do it during the day a couple of times a day and particularly
in the evening they're well known for coming in for a drink before they go to roost and this behaviour gives us an
opportunity to survey these animals that are normally forage over a very large area
at a small number of sites because they're focused and concentrated in on those sites so that makes it much easier
for us to get a clear count of what's going on with the population
so the results from the last two years we've had the great inland glossy account running for since 2019 and we've
done it twice so far volunteers have made a huge contribution to the counts
we've had 159 people participating and that's sort of there's some double ups in there because we've had people out
multiple times but overall those people have contributed over 715 hours of their time
to help us with the counts which has just been awesome and it's a massive part of what we're doing and we couldn't do the counts
without people volunteering to help us we've had glossy black scene at all three sites for each of the years that
we've run the count but there's been a shift
the shift from the very very dry drought that we had in 2019 to the very wet very wet la nina systems that we've had the
last couple years has impacted the results so to give you a bit of an idea
what we've got here is the these three graphs show the results for the last two years for all three sites
in the in the graphs the center column is the for each of the years is the number of glossy black cockatoos and in
you can see in the pillager we had 510 glossies cited in 2019-20
and then in 2020 21 it dropped down to 54. same thing happened in gnu with 246
glossies counted in 20 1920 and then in 2021 we had 11.
goo bang on the other hand went the other way we had two animals cited in 2019 and then
six in 2020 the numbers are still low um we know that but that's still because if
you remember we're still trying to work out what's happening with goobang where the animals are drinking
how they're moving within that landscape because we don't have any previous information to inform us there so still
a lot of work going on in there but this change if you go back to peliga and gnu
is pretty indicative of the fact that we've gone from incredibly dry where everything was focused on those water
points to very very wet and a lot of freestanding water right across the landscape and
generally the glossy blacks are much more dispersed within the landscape and less dependent on those fixed watering
points so the count is still continuing even though this is the case because it gives us
an opportunity to look at change in relation to changing of the seasons and these changes from very wet very dry to
very wet and we're assuming that at some point it'll start to go dry again and we're expecting that this year's
result happening this month will be similar to last year given the conditions that we've seen
so the how the what and the where of the great inland glossy count so how we run the count is that
basically we get people out to go and sit at the water points and and watch for animals but due to covert 19
restrictions last year particularly but also this year the count has to be undertaken by remote deployment and what
that means is that we have everyone getting registered to who
are going to participate registered through the volunteer information portal which i'll put a link up for in a second
and once the people have registered in there each volunteer is then assigned to undertake the account
at a certain low watering point for all the sites and then the maps and other relevant information is emailed out
the thursday before the count so the emails for the pillager will go out on
thursday the 10th of february and emails for gnu will go out on thursday the 17th of february and that gives you time to
get that information review it and get prepared to go out in the field and make sure you know where you're going
once you've got all that information then the volunteers themselves they go out and they make their way to their
site and they get set up on the day of the count by 6 p.m the latest and we say 6 p.m because that gives you plenty of
time to get in there get settled get organized position yourself so you've got a good view of the water point
so that you can be ready for the count and volunteers can go there earlier if they really want
make the day of it a few people do but it really is up to you but 6 pm is this the point we need you there
and that positioning thing is really important because if you're too close to the water point the birds will spook and
they won't come in to drink and we really need them to be able to come down so you can get a good look at
them so you'll know if you're too close during your setup phase because other
birds and animals won't go near the water point they'll spook when they see you and they'll all take off so if that's happening you just move
back a bit still with a good view so you can see the water point and all the trees around it
and then you sit back and you wait you enjoy the evening if the glossies come in to drink basically record all the information
that's required as per the data sheets that we supply and usually the first sign that you'll get
that they're coming in is you'll hear them calling and they sound like a low pitched creaky door as they communicate
with one another as they fly in for a drink and then you stay on site until the last
animals have flown away or it gets too dark to see and then pack up and make your way home a few people do camp which
is also an option as well so where you can as i said we're focused
on those water points across all three sites and those sites are selected based on a
number of factors depending on the sites so with the pilliga it's got over 80 water points right
across the pelican forest so that's the national parks the forestry areas the awc area all combined
and so we narrow down the where we're going to count by looking at accessibility which is a major critical
factor for the pelliger because we've got particularly with the weather we've had there's some issues with with access
to some points but also we narrow it down a bit further by looking at sites where we know the gloss is frequent
where we've got regular records and that helps us narrow down we'd like to get
all 80 water points counted some year but at the moment we we never seem to be able to manage it it's always going to
be a narrower subset of that group but it's been good results so far as you've
seen gnu has a smaller number of water points so there's i think 12 all up across the gnu forest area
and so the aim there is to target all of those but again accessibility given road conditions is a fact that we
need to to consider every time and with goo bang basically we're still
we've got very few water points out there that we can use across the reserve and so we're still targeting those where we can
and what we're going to do is looking at alternate methods and also other sites that we can consider and
that includes for all three sites we're keen to expand into areas of the surrounding crane land
surrounding the crown land so that means private property now the tenures so if people know of a site that's near
these areas on private property or other tenure and would be interested in participating please let us know we'd
love to have you out there on your dams watching the glossies come in to drink of an evening and contribute that information to help
us with the counts it would certainly expand particularly for googbang exactly where we're what we're finding out and
getting more information so how to register the account this if you haven't already done so there is
still plenty of time to get involved in the counts with the pilliga forest count happening next saturday on the 12th of
february and as i said the registration close on the 9th of february
and the gnu state conservation area national park is on the 19th of february with
registrations closing on the 16th goo bang isn't being surveyed this year unfortunately because we've had some
issues with access and some other problems and we're trying to sort that out so it's unfortunately this year
we've had to drop it off but we are continuing to work on that so if you are in that landscape please let us know if
you're interested in being involved in work happening there as well to register for the count you go to that
address which is nsw parks dot info glossy
or in your browser search for great inland glossy count and that will bring you to the link as well and you
basically it's the takes you to the national park event website page and then you click on the book now
button and create a login or log into the volunteer information portal fill in all the details
and while you're there make sure you select which weekend you'd like to participate so that we can know and we can assign you to the
site within those water point within those sites to complete your registration
what you need to bring to be part of the count apart from your good self is we'd recommend the following things a
map the map that we supply of how to get there but if you've got a broader map of the landscape you're going into that's very useful
pen pencil the data sheets are pretty important because they've got everything there and
we can pull all that information off as we need but if you forget it then a notebook so you can record what
you see binoculars are absolutely crucial because you're not going to be sitting right on top of the birds on the water
water point you're going to be sitting back a bit so you need those to make sure you've got your id's right and also if we're going to
get counts of males females and the juveniles which we'll get laura back on to talk about that in a minute
a field god for australian birds is always useful a really comfy chair is a must plenty of food and water
drinking water sunscreen instrict repellent this year is an absolute musketeers of the mozzies with all the water around a hat
dress for the conditions and some sturdy boots
so the last bit to talk about is bit about the safety the landscape in which these counts are undertaken is generally
remote and that so that you have an enjoyable account you need to remember to have the following things make sure you've got
enough food and water in case of emergencies bring appropriate clothing for the
conditions so if it's going to be cold warm clothing it's going to be hot something cool so that you're comfortable
and ensure your vehicle is well maintained has an inflated spare and is suitable for the terrain in which you're traveling
this photo is from the pilliga and it's of some of the conditions we've been dealing with for the last
six months and as you can see there it's pretty nasty we really
are going to try and make sure that we're not seeing you along roads that look like that but if you do come across one as you're trying to access your site
we don't want you to go in there common sense prevails take a look turn around go out let us know that you're safe and
that what you found it you couldn't make it to the dam the water point and we'll write that one off for this
year and just make a note that we need to look at the roads and work that one out so leading on from that a mobile
phone or a satellite phone for communication with the project team is important as well and we require that
all the volunteers must check in before they go into their sites by a text or a phone call
and noting that phone reception across these project sites is patchy at best
so pick a suitable point where you've got phone reception let us know that you're heading in and then as you leave
and once you get back out and you're basically safely on the on the road heading on your way home and you're in
reception send us another text or a phone call to say that you're safe staff will be working around in the area
so we'll also be out doing the counts as well and if you get into problems you can let us know and we can try and help
um we can come in and sort that out as well so that's that's basically the way we work
it and in terms of details as there's a lot more information that's provided as the information package that gets
emailed out to you so you've got some more information about how to do it who to contact and all of that stuff
so that's it for me in terms of the gradient glossy count thank you very much for listening and i
think we're going to hand back to laura thanks adam so i'm here today to talk
about the glossy black so the glossy black cockatoo is one of the smallest black cockatoos ranging
from around 46 to 50 centimeters in length they have a wingspan of about 90 centimeters and they weigh around 425
grams their life expectancy is believed to exceed 15 years but could possibly
extend to around 50 years or more so the glossy black has a small and
inconspicuous crest and above the bulbous spill eye ring and legs are a dark gray colour the body is a dull
black colour with feathers on the head neck and under parts fringed in brown the tail has red to an orange yellow
tail panel which are clearly visible when the birds are in flight juvenile birds will have black horizontal bands
between the colours in their tail which diminishes with age the bird on the right in this picture is
a young adult male and we can tell this by the bands that you can see in that tail those those black lines
female and male birds are distinctly different female glossy blacks are more brightly colored than males which is a
rare trait amongst birds it suggests that there is a strong competition among females for resources
or for male attention so you can see here this one is a female
she's she's a younger one which you can tell by the striping in the tail so females have a wider tail with reddish
orange to yellow panels barred with black the tail may become less barred and more red with age
but what makes them very distinctive is they'll have these irregular yellow markings around their head and neck
they can vary in intensity from a few spots to a full coloring of a covering of yellow and they may also have yellow
flecks on the under parts and under wings so here we have a male
the male bird has a browner color on the head and under parts
and it has a prominent red panel in the tail this picture is a younger male
so you can you can see that by the barring which is a little bit hard to see but still visible in this picture
so the glossy blacks are widespread although uncommon they occur in low densities throughout suitable forest and
woodland habitats their range is from the central queensland coast to east gippsland in victoria there is also a
small population in the new south wales riverina and an isolated population on kangaroo island down in south australia
they are occasionally recorded well beyond the usual range which suggests that the species moves between different
areas when they need to in new south wales the current distribution of the glossy black is from
the coast to the tablelands and as far west as the riverina and peliga scrub scientists think that glossy blacks
prefer to live in open rugged country where extensive clearing has not taken place in inland new south wales they target
areas of brigalo scrub hilly rocky country or timbered watercourses where casuarina species are common they are
frequently seen throughout the filiga genuine goobang the map on the screen shows all of the
glossy black sightings that have been recorded in new south wales glossy blacks prefer to nest in the
hollows of large old eucalyptus trees either living or dead a good hollow is close to water can be between 3 to 30
meters above the ground has an entrance diameter of at least 15 centimeters and is around a metre deep
the hollow will be vertical or near vertical and is generally lined with wood chips chewed from the edge they
will tend to nest in the same area as other nesting glossy black pears and can
even share the same tree if more than one hollow is available the same hollow is often used again in
subsequent years by the same or different females glossy blacks must compete with other hollow dependent mammals such as possums
and gliders and other birds such as the lars and sulphur crested cockatoos for a suitable nesting hollow
the birds are not strictly territorial amongst themselves as they may forage over large areas but they may defend
nest trees and favored feeding areas the adult birds will mate for life and pears will maintain their bond
throughout the year in the central west breeding can take place between march to august
reading time varies across their range and it's thought the timing corresponds to the reproduction of their local feed
tree species a single white egg is laid in the hollow the egg is incubated for around 30 days
during which time the female will remain on the nest and is fed by the male once the chick is born there are some
instances where both parents will feed the chick and the female will breed the chick overnight but at other times only
the female will brewed and feed the chick the chick is fledged after about 90 days and they only have the one chick per
season a young bird will stay with its parents for at least a year after fledging
glossy blacks will have a lower breeding rate during dry years when their food source is in lower supply aloe cash
arena have reduced seed productivity in dry years so any increase in drought frequency or length is likely to have a
negative effect on the population of the glossy black
glossy blacks are social birds and are typically observed in pairs or family groups the small groups can join
together to form larger feeding flocks in the evenings they may also congregate in large numbers as they come down to
water the birds need to come to water to drink every day they prefer to drink at sites
where vegetation grows close to the water's edge with a resting place and cover from predators when temperatures
are high the birds may need to drink more frequently throughout the day glossy blacks are highly specialized in
their food choice and will feed almost exclusively on the seeds which you are allocation arena species
there is also evidence that the bird is selective in its choice of allocation arena trees and will choose casuarinas
that produce seeds with a high nutrient value a pair of glossy blacks may make short visits to various feed trees in a small
area checking the quality of the seeds once they're satisfied the pair will settle in the feed tree and harvest all
the cones within reach the birds use their left foot to rotate the cone and their large bill to crack and shred the
cones and access the kernels they are often quiet and inconspicuous while feeding but will make a soft
clicking sound with their bills the birds are highly selective of both the trees and the coins they favor and
will often return to particular trees in which they have foraged previously they will choose the younger red colored
cones as they are more nutritious and have a high seed weight in order to yield as much seed as possible for their
cone opening efforts they will also use older cones when fresh ones are not available
the glossy black will concentrate their feeding in larger stands of allocation arena containing mature trees with large
cone and seed crops the larger stands reduce the need to move between trees which lowers the overall foraging requirements and the
energy that needs to be expended less movement between trees may also reduce the predation risk from birds of
prey they avoid feeding in areas of sparse canopy cover
depending on the availability of food a bird may require between 83 to 122 cones
per day if a bird is breeding they will feed on a higher number of cones per day and spend more time foraging than
non-breeding birds a breeding male will forage for just over six hours a day in order to feed
himself and the female while she is brooding males have been found to flourish more efficiently than females and juveniles
forage less efficiently than both the male and female adults glossy blacks will also occasionally eat
seeds from eucalypts and gophers acacias and heikis as well as insect larvae in the central west where they inhabit the
cypress ironbark forest the aloe casuarina gamathera and alakazarina diminuta are important food resources
they have also been known to eat the seeds of cypress pine the presence of feeding glossy blacks is often indicated by a layer of chewed
cones and fragments that have accumulated under their favorite allocation arena trees the chewed cones can remain on the
ground for several weeks to months and are a clear indication that the stands of ella casuarina has been used for
feeding glossy black cockatoos are strong fliers and can average over 45 kilometers an
hour in sustained flight they will fly up to 14 kilometers daily between their feeding and nesting areas without
breeding success being compromised but they prefer to forage closer when food is available
their flight is buoyant with a shallow effortless beating of the wings they prefer to travel through the canopy and
not over open country individuals tend to remain close to their family flock but can disperse when
required when they do disperse they can move large distances of between 44 to 78
kilometers away although there is evidence that they have traveled up to 300 kilometers in northern queensland
the glossy black is now rare or locally extinct in many parts of its former range it's listed as vulnerable in new
south wales and endangered on the federal schedule the main threat to the glossy black is the degradation loss and fragmentation
of foraging and breeding habitat allocation arena trees are being lost due to clearing and fires poor
regeneration of these trees can occur due to crazy grazing and repeated burning
losing hollow-bearing nest trees also has a significant impact on breeding success the trees are removed during
land clearing for firewood or burned during a wide wildfire or hazard reduction burn
in 2007 a fire in gnu destroyed much of the feeding habitat and nest trees used by the glossy blacks while the landscape
has recovered the loss of nest trees is still having an impact on the species so they installed
some pvc pipe nest boxes back in around 2010 to try and
alleviate that problem but they they haven't been too successful unfortunately community involvement can help conserve
these species by assisting with surveys at water points and foraging areas the number of birds can be recorded and monitored this
can impact on the decisions made around the management of the surrounding landscape by working together we can all
help this amazing bird thanks for listening and i look forward to any questions at the end of today's
session so i'd now like to hand over to dr pat tapp a senior field ecologist
with forestry corporation of new south wales and pat oversees the pre-harvesting flora and fauna surveys
and biodiversity monitoring on lands across western new south wales welcome pat
thanks laura what's um what i'd like to do is just provide you an overview of some of
the tactics that we're going to be using to learn more about
what the glossy blacks actually get up to when we find that
when they move away from dams and also what parts of the landscape they're
using so what we know so far we know that glossy black cockatoos nest
in tree hollows and that they'll fly long distances between nesting
and feeding sites we know that they feed on the kinds of
allocation arena plants i just put some arrows there to show you these are
uh shrubs of allocation arena jimmy neuter they'll feed on other allocation ranges
and they'll also feed on cash on cash arena
called below and that's particularly prominent in areas where we don't get uh allocation arenas
and they come down to water to drink and some people theorize that
they potentially also come to these regular water points as much as
anything to socialize because we have noticed that not all birds
uh will come down to drink they'll hang around the area for quite a while uh in
in their family groups and that needs to be taken into account we start
conducting surveys for these birds the other thing to take into account
is that we have as adam said we have at least 80 water
points in this case i'm talking about the villager and the indicative habitat for the
glossy black cockatoo in the pilliga for example spans some 270 000 hectares
and to get a bit of perspective on that uh the pelican if you put draw a straight line easterly
at its widest point we're talking about 120 kilometers so talking about large areas
that we need to survey i thought i'd just talk a bit about
the way we survey for birds it's changed a lot since i started or 30 odd years ago are
surveying for wildlife and it's now heavily influenced by changes
in technology so when i started the old survey kit was basically a film
camera a notebook a pair of binoculars a compass handheld
conversation navigation a hard copy map and a field guide
and that was all shoved into your backpack and off you went
now these days we've got digital cameras and i'll talk about the significance of that in a minute
we've got gps's for navigation so and also
maps on tablets like ipads and we can also enter data on those
but more significantly we've got we can use remotely deployed cameras
and sound recorders
and we use those really to supplement the surveys that have been done to date
on dams and we deploy those into
ad dams because we've got a lot of them and in seating habitat that we've already
identified so here's an example on the left i've just shown you some images
of a song meter in a tram which is just a brand of acoustic recorder and this is actually
in my front yard i took it yesterday and a camera in a different part of the same tree
so the advantage of these devices is that they are digital which means that
we can analyze the information using computers the other advantage is that we can
deploy them for long periods we can program them to record continuously or increase the intervals
in the case of cameras they can be motion activated or we can have them say take a picture every five minutes
five minutes or every minute we can take video and
they're cost compared to on-ground observers now before we get too carried away
we have to be aware of some of the downsides that they can recall thousands of images and
sound files which need to be cataloged and stored
unlike going to the dam or going for a walk
the results are not instant they rely on so we need to look at the
information and because there's so many files we need to use
computer technology which is still being developed for rapid sorting and identification
the other thing we need to bear in mind is that you put a sound recorder out there
unlike human hearing you're not necessarily hearing everything
um other than what's in the general vicinity like i know i've done barking
our surveys and i can hear barking hours calling for
up to a kilometer away so it depends on the sensitivity of the microphone so the important thing here
is that you need multiple sites to develop an accurate picture
so i just thought i'd speak quickly about the data that comes out
are from a song meter which is a digital recorder
so the idea is that we convert
the digital signal is can we can
have a look at that as a visual image and that visual image
is analyzed using what's called recognizers which need to be developed for that species
and once you've got that it's based on particular patterns and
you can see on the images to the right there's squiggly marks there and
um the one on the bottom uh the tower of course there's three of
them there that's a particular i think that could well possibly be
juveniles with begging noises and these other smaller
squiggles in between those so we can develop a recognizer
based on reference calls to
eventually use the computer to rapidly sort through and classify
thousands of call files in the old days we would call that up and do them one by
one now obviously uh that's not practical now forestry has been doing this sort of
work putting out this sort of equipment since 2013
and we'll be deploying uh the gear that we're using on our other projects uh on to this project as
well the thing to bear in mind that any output that we have needs to be checked
by an experienced observer now in the time that's remaining i just thought i'd show you
some pictures of what we've captured on camera uh in our in another monitoring project
that we're working on and if you have a look in the center of
our bottom center of the photo on the left you'll see a tube there
and we've got a camera pointing at that tube and it's got a bait inside which is
a peanut butter and also a little one with sesame oil
and it's used as a bit of an attractant now all the work that we do
is under permit from the department of planning and environment and complies
with uh animal ethics so we can't just go out there willy nilly and do this work we have to use
approved protocols and train surveyors
and do it under reproducible methodologies
okay so here we go third on the left that's a common bronze link
on the right we've got some emus visiting a jam which we
are observed during testing of our cameras on the left
an apostle bird grey crowned babbler which is one of our threatened birds in the philigo
swamp olivier on the left blackstrike wallaby uh another one of our threatened species
also captured in the pilliga now we can also take pictures at night
so these cameras have got a black flash um so hence we get a grey photo
on the left there's some grey kangaroo on the right it's an echidna
we can also get pictures of very small animals that's the yellow 40 down econs
on the left and the waist monitor on the right side capturing different
species now we can also get information on
foxes and other feral animals which helps which will assist with
where we might need to direct predator control so we've got a cast of a lot goats
yes cats and pigs and
that's it thank you back to libby for question time
thank you so much pat that was great all right i'd like to welcome back all of our panelists if you could all um put
on your microphones and join in the discussion so now is the time um for questions and
we've had some answers put through for some of the questions um i think adam has answered some of
those in uh in the chat i think we'll just start with one which was the type
of software used in a type of database so um pat's had a bit of a chat about the
technology that we're using uh there's not a a particular type of software or a
particular type of database but pat you might like to talk a little bit more to that if you have any further information
or we can um email the um the attendee and just and let them know
if there's any further details on that yeah look i'm happy to learn another utmd but
broadly speaking uh we use we're sort of exploring the use of proprietary software there's
a software put out by wildlife acoustics from the us we actually
uh use one of their recorders uh and there's also work
uh that we're doing with uh one of our forestry's project partners the department of primary
industry where we're developing recognizers
okay thanks pat that's great another question is the likelihood of localized populations traveling to
other areas to socialize and communicate with other family groups adam perhaps you might like to um talk about that
yeah thanks libby uh basically what we know between the
across that broad distribution of the glossy black cockatoo the image that laura put up that show a very
strong concentration along the ranges in the coast of the inland there isn't a lot or very much interchange at all
between those populations so the inland population is separate in terms of movement between sites for
interaction social or otherwise we're fairly confident that that does happen they will range over a very large
area and i think laura did point out that they're not necessarily territorial like some other species
so that's not the big factor they will move around and they will cover large areas particularly if they're on the
hunt for food or their favorite area for food disappears so yeah there is a
a distinct chance that they're going to move from say the pillager up around narrabri all the way down towards parks
but you know they need those stepping stones to be able to do it is across that landscape
great thanks very much adam and just wanted to say thank you to everyone really really interesting presentations
as always i learned something new every time uh question three i would like to
volunteer and become more involved in the industry and would love some direction so here's a great opportunity to register
for the inland glossy account either at the pilliga or the gnu i'm not sure
where where you are based but if you'd like to send me an email and now and my email address
is now in the public in the public chat that would be that would be good and then i can talk
to you a little bit more about that i think we've covered how the survey is organized so it's pretty much a combined
effort of the inland glossy team who work it out
particularly with national parks they do the lion's share of that in particular adam so that's uh that's absolutely um
a really important thing that we do quite regularly we generally run the um surveys we had hoped to run in
november but both of the novembers we'd wanted to run them it was it was uh too wet or there were fires so that's when
we came round to doing them in february we do certainly have some data and
information uh regarding some nest box design but as laura in um
indicated in her presentation there hasn't been a great deal of success i
know they've had some success certainly after the fires on kangaroo island in south australia and that's worked quite
well for glossy blacks and yes the nest boxes that are currently there are
being monitored and that has really been restricted again because of
very wet weather and conditions but that certainly is uh is being done
libby i was just going to say there has been uh there is other research going on particularly post fire
within the warren bungles um part of the landscape looking at nest boxes and how
they're used by animals and what other factors need to be considered and there's also a lot of work post the 2019
20 bushfires as well more broadly across the state so there is a lot of work going on and a lot of attempts to try and find
solutions along those lines so it is something that we are looking into um but it is a very big question and as
laura's already indicated and libby there are problems with the nest boxes that we've had out the birds aren't
using them as much so it's something we're continuing to work on thanks thanks adam the there are other
options of using uh options like augmented hollows which can
be done either with chainsaws or with a new uh device called a
hollow hog a hollow hog which i'm happy to send out some information i could perhaps put a link
when we send out the recording link in the next day or so i can i can send that
through to people uh question uh another question was can we access
seedlings or tube stock to grow on our property as a food source for the birds and i would be very happy to
provide some information on the types of species that you'd need depending on where you are
and any supplementary plantings if you get in touch touch with me on my email address there
and another question was has there been any interaction with the biodiversity conservation trust
we've actually had some wonderful volunteers come out in one of our previous surveys from the biodiversity
conservation trust but specifically working uh closely with them um
not not particularly um but um i think that's probably a very good suggestion and i think that's yeah that's a great
one there was question about the difference between the calls of the yellow black cockatoos and the glossy blacks yeah
they're quite distinctly different um as i said glossy black is a creaky door and
a yellowtail black is quite a very strong loud screech and uh very very
clear they are very different in the way they behave and everything so
great thanks probably worth adding to that one of the advantages of the internet is one can go
on to youtube and there's lots of calls on youtube
and if for questions like that you can actually type in there glossy black cockatoo call versus
whatever other call and invariably a lot of that information
will become available uh the other thing i just follow up on what adam said about the roads
is that uh we will prior to uh the next account coming up we will endeavor to go
too sick seek information about the road conditions and probably go to some
dodgy road so we will make every attempt to ensure that we don't direct you
to a dam where which may well be inaccessible because of the
high levels of rainfall we've had great thanks very much pat that's a very very
good point to make um just because we're just about uh we're just on one o'clock now
and thank you very much belinda you put up our surveys or just there's another couple of questions there for goo bang have we
looked at bird data or either to find places away from the park what we've
what we've actually done is contacted private land holders over the last two years well over six or
seven hundred private land holders around each of the parks to ask them become engaged with um doing our surveys
and and providing them with extra information but yeah bird data or a bird is is
a good suggestion and the other ones i think that probably
were now that we're just on time i will put we can get back in touch with you
regarding the the rest of the questions um have either of the other president has wanted to make any further last
comments before we let people go off and have their lunch i just noticed there was a question about trying to use drones
we haven't for this project however think of using them
for other species so certainly drones are in the mix
for various wildlife the issue we have with drones
particularly for something like a glossy black cockatoo is basically scaring the hell out of it
and also um the other one is that um if you fly your drone in the wrong
spot it'll get knocked out of the sky by things like our wedge star legals and
you'll get one dead drone thanks thanks bet so what we'll do is we'll um answer
any other questions in a follow-up email that we'll send in the next day or so
but i just wanted to say thank you very much indeed um we had a big number of people on the webinar which has been
fantastic thank you very much to all our presenters for providing some really really important
information and hopefully you've enjoyed the last hour or so you will get the recording in the next day or so so if
you um would like to you can re-listen if you've missed out on some information or please send any of us an email and we'll
follow up with your queries and questions there but um thank you very much indeed and thank you libby thank
you to our presenters laura adam and pat for sharing your valuable information
and thank you to our audience for your valuable contribution in the discussions today
i wish you all a lovely afternoon
