Australia Day Celebration – One for our Native Birds

This Australia Day weekend Laura and I were able to-do our bit for the native hollow dwelling birds and mammals.

There were a few Indian Mynas about the property last week but we had been unable to lure them to our trap near the house even with our caller. So Friday night we set another trap (without a caller) in the area where we had seen some of them on the ground.

Saturday morning a flock of Mynas descended on the trap and soon we had several in the trap. By nightfall after the remaining un-trapped Mynas had left the area, we went to check the results, 16 birds trapped!  We had seen more, using binoculars, around the trap earlier, so we set a second trap.

This time we put two callers in each trap and on Sunday another 14 ventured in making a total of 30 birds in 2 days. One trap is still out but either we got them all or they have moved on for now.

There have never been this many birds here before. These two days tally is more than our previous three years.

Remote South Pacific island aims to be first in the world to eliminate mynas

Early last century, the myna was introduced to Atiu Island in Cook Islands as a way of controlling insects and other pests in crops and gardens.

But within a few short years, its aggressive behaviour destroyed the local bird populations.

In 2000, the myna was declared to be among the world's 100 worst invasive species.

The people of Atiu have gone a step further, declaring a war on the myna - calling themselves the 'myanators'.

To see the rest of the story follow this link to the ABC website  http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-01-06/an-cook-islands-aims-to-be-first-in-the-world-to-eliminate-myna/5185870

5000 MYNAS DOWN and STILL COUNTING

The CVCIA's Indian Myna group has now removed over 5000 of the pest birds from our pristine Clarence Valley environment, thereby allowing thousands more nest sites available for our wonderful natives.
Well done all trappers, keep up the great work.
Remember even if you only stop one pair from breeding over a couple of years they could have produced over one hundred offspring.