Lifeline for Perth Zoo vets dealing with starving black cockatoo influx

The state government has addressed the unfolding mass starvation crisis facing black cockatoos with a one-off funding injection for frontline vets and volunteers.

WAtoday recently reported Perth Zoo and suburban rehab centres were flooded with emaciated birds after Perth’s hottest-ever summer and delayed winter rainfall decimated food sources and stopped them breeding.

A Carnaby’s black cockatoo in a Perth pine tree. Credit: Lea Scaddan

The state government has now provided $50,000 to Perth Zoo’s veterinary department and $20,000 to a Perth specialist black cockatoo rehabilitation centre to help them rehabilitate and release the birds.

“The state government is committed to conserving our state’s iconic Carnaby’s cockatoos based on expert advice,” Environment Minister Reece Whitby said.

Whitby said the decision followed him asking the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions to examine the starvation issue following WAtoday’s report.

“While I’m advised this is currently the most appropriate course of action and that a supplementary feeding program is not backed by science, I will of course consider further actions to protect our state’s cockatoos where appropriate,” he said.

WAtoday understands the government has not ruled out a special taskforce, as called for by conservationists, but that the department has thus far not recommended one.

Murdoch University School of Veterinary Medicine Professor Kris Warren said environmental group Carnaby’s Crusaders’ application to hand-feed cockatoos in Perth with sunflower seeds was not the answer.

Warren said the birds needed to eat a diverse range of healthy native seeds, and that sunflower seed feeding could cause disease, death, behaviour change and reduced survival capacity.

Environmental and conservation law and policy expert Dr Hugh Finn said the real matter at hand was protecting the further decimation of black cockatoo habitat.

Perth faced a choice: either “manage the species to extinction”, or build city landscapes that helped them recover.

The parrot bush – this one shown in Kings Park – is a vital Carnaby’s cockatoo food source at certain times of the year. Credit: Robbie Goodall

This meant not only halting further clearing of habitat but building more food and water and roosting resources into the landscape.

Finn said that included protecting the remaining 1800 hectares of pine trees in Perth’s northern suburbs, which was critical for feeding new chicks; banksia woodland, which provided a range of food plants with seed and nectar; and the rapidly disappearing parrotbush (banksia sessilis) thickets on limestone ridges.

“But the effects of the drought point to another message – the catastrophic effect of extreme climate events like droughts and heat waves. These events can cause high mortality in the short term, and also in the longer term, as we saw native plants die and fail to seed this year,” he said.

“In many areas of the Swan Coastal Plain, there just isn’t the native plant food in the landscape to feed even the diminished populations we have now. Thus, those decline.

“We cannot keep removing native food plants from the Perth-Peel landscape and expect populations to recover.

“That points toward the need for an urban forest far thicker and far more resilient than the fragile and ever-depleting fabric of remnant woodlands and natural areas that we have now.”

Kaarakin Black Cockatoo Conservation Centre found and chair Glenn Dewhurst said the $20,000 funding would help sustain efforts during the spike in cockatoo admissions.

“The situation is urgent, and we are grateful for the government’s close watch and support as we navigate this challenge,” he said.

The key plank of a state Carnaby’s Cockatoo Recovery Plan 2012-2022 stated the main task as “protecting the birds throughout their life stages and enhancing habitat critical for survival.” No update or replacement plan has yet been published.

The crisis funding is not the only action the government has taken for black cockatoos.

It provided hundreds of thousands of dollars to groups supporting cockatoos in this year’s State Natural Resource Management grants, including for things like nesting boxes and rehabilitation centre upgrades, but only one of these projects, in the Great Southern, specifically mentions revegetation.

The government has also ended commercial timber harvesting and is expanding WA’s conservation estate with at least 400,000 additional hectares of national parks, conservation parks and nature reserves – but it has also approved major clearing of areas of the northern jarrah forest for bauxite mining, most recently on Friday when it overturned environmental conditions on South32’s Worsley alumina mine expansion.

A year ago this week, it withdrew its plan to log the remaining 1800 hectares of Perth’s pine plantations, but two years ago it had abandoned the Strategic Assessment of the Perth and Peel Regions which contained a sub-strategy to replace 5000 hectares of pines as a permanent food source.

There is as yet no large-scale revegetation strategy announced for the pine plantation land.

If you see a black cockatoo that appears injured or unwell

Call the Wildcare Helpline on 9474 9055.

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