A recent Sydney Morning Herald article on Towra Point and Migratory Birds
"Habitat replacement keeps visitors posted"
Jennie Curtin March 31, 2010
IF you're about to fly from Sydney to the Arctic Circle to find a mate, it helps to have a place to rest and conserve your energy. Which is why the NSW Environment Department has installed artificial roosting posts at the Towra Point wetlands near Kurnell, where many migrating shorebirds come to escape the bitter northern hemisphere winter.
The birds, including bar-tailed godwits, eastern curlews and whimbrels, are following ancient migration patterns which can involve an incredible 17,500-kilometre round trip each year. The godwits have been tracked via satellite leaving the east coast in the autumn, stopping in the Yellow Sea between China and Korea to refuel, then flying another 6000 kilometres to Alaska to breed. On the return trip in August, some have been known to fly back non-stop - nine days without eating, drinking or sleeping.
The Towra Point Nature Reserve, under the flight path of some bigger birds in the form of 747s, is an important sanctuary and feeding ground for the visitors and one of the few remaining wetlands in the city which have not been lost to development.
The birds have for years perched on the local oyster leases, jetties and barges but in high tides these disappear. A local National Parks ranger, Jason Bishop, said many of the structures were also in bad repair. "We were concerned that without a planned replacement of roosting habitat, the birds coming to Towra Point in the future would not have enough roosting spots to support them,'' he said. The new structures, made up of 48 hardwood posts and 22 hardwood rails, stand four metres tall, well above the waterline in even the highest of tides.
But the new roosts will take some getting used to. Yesterday they were ignored by all but a few seagulls. A natural heritage officer with the department, Deb Andrew, said this was probably because they looked ''a bit too strange and new''. ''It's probably quite sensible to be wary of new things - it could be a trap - but we're sure that as they weather and the birds get used to them, they will use them.''
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