Orange bellied parrots begin returning to Melaleuca

Critically endangered parrots which only breed in Tasmania have begun flying back to Melaleuca. Here’s why things could be looking up for the birds.

Orange-bellied parrot

Critically endangered orange bellied parrots have begun returning to their West Coast Tasmanian breeding ground at Melaleuca, and it’s been confirmed some of the returned birds were born in captivity.

Orange-bellied Parrots only breed in Melaleuca in the summer before migrating north, across Bass Strait in late summer and autumn to spend the winter in Victoria and South Australia.

As of Monday, four of the birds had returned to the site after migrating from the mainland, two were born in the wild, one was born in captivity at Victoria’s Moonlit Sanctuary, and one was from Tasmania’s captive-bred population.

Some orange bellied parrots have been fitted with tracking devices as part of the program to monitor their migration. Picture: Joanne Young

To prepare for the arrival of the birds, staff from the Orange Bellied Parrot Tasmanian Program were at Melaleuca last week, installing nesting boxes.

Volunteers from the have also returned to the area, where they will observe and identify the species movements, along with other tasks.

“Our dedicated volunteers will provide supplementary feed and monitor feed tables every day from now through to April to provide critical information on the wild population,” a spokesperson of the program said on social media.

“Our partners with captive populations are also in full swing preparing for our upcoming Spring release in the next few weeks, which aims to increase the number of potential breeding pairs in the wild population.”

Orange-bellied parrots, Melaleuca, Tasmania's South West Wilderness, Credit: NRE Tasmania

More parrots are expected to return from now until December and in the coming weeks more captive-bred parrots will be released at Melaleuca, to improve the chances of breeding.

Last year there were 81 of the species counted at the Melaleuca breeding grounds, beating the previous year’s record of 77.

Of last season’s parrots, 31 were females and 50 were male. 24 were wild born, six of which were captive-bred juveniles from the previous season.

Funding was provided last year to track the birds.

“In 2023-24 the Government provided $1.3m over two years for tracking birds during their migration and maintaining critical infrastructure at the Five Mile Beach captive breeding facility,” Parks Minister Nick Duigan said.