TRIAP Franklin 2008 Waterbirds

1) As part of the Tropical Rivers Inventory and Assessment Project (TRIAP), a database of 94,148 waterbird records was assembled, comprising 82,596 records from the TRIAP area and 11,552 records from a surrounding 10 km buffer. These records were sourced from databases for Atlas1 and Atlas2 provided by Birds Australia, 99.1% of which are from the Historical Atlas (pre-1977), the first Field Atlas (1977-1981) or the second Field Atlas (1997-2002).
2) Waterbirds were defined to include species of freshwater and coastal wetlands including in-shore but not off-shore marine species. The TRIAP waterbird fauna comprises 145 species from twenty families, of which 112 species are represented in the database by more than ten records.
3) One TRIAP waterbird species – the Australian Painted Snipe – is listed as threatened under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBCA). Eighty-seven species are listed as "migratory" under the EPBCA, 44 species are listed under the Japan-Australia Migratory Bird Agreement and 53 species under the China-Australia Migratory Bird Agreement. The geographical characteristics of all listed species are summarised for the TRIAP area.
4) In the TRIAP area, the Australian Painted Snipe is an infrequent visitor or perhaps rare resident found more frequently in the more arid south. Its preferred habitat of ephemeral wetlands with a mix of mud-flats and dense low vegetation does not closely match habitats recorded for the species in the TRIAP area, which may reflect the marginal nature of its occurrence in this area. Breeding records in the TRIAP area have been in flooded grasslands.
5) A foraging guild classification based on a classification of foraging substrate, foraging methods and food types is presented in this dataset. Twelve foraging guilds are recognised as occurring in the TRIAP area.
6) No waterbirds are endemic to the TRIAP area. However, the TRIAP area represents a major proportion of the range of the Chestnut Rail, and a major proportion of the Australian range of the Great-billed Heron.
7) A biogeographic classification of TRIAP waterbirds is developed based on breeding distributions. Four classes are recognised: a. species for whom TRIAP is a core breeding area; b. Australasian species for whom TRIAP is marginal to their main distribution; c. Palaearctic / Nearctic migrants – these do not breed in Australia; and d. Non-migratory species with a distribution centre in Asia, or Malaysia including New Guinea. Few species other than vagrants have restricted ranges within the TRIAP area, but there is a weak declining gradient in species richness from east to west.
8) The distribution of waterbird families, foraging guilds and threatened species were compared qualitatively with a 1:250 000 classification of waterbodies into seven units. Although the results are "noisy", groups associated with deep water and saline habitats were clearly identifiable. A geomorphic classification of rivers provides only linear data and poor spatial correspondence with waterbird records. Neither classification provides a direct measure of the wetland features most relevant to most species, and whilst quantitative analysis could be pursued, it appears unlikely to identify many definitive habitat relationships.
See Table 6, section 3.3 of (Franklin 2008) for an explanation of foraging guilds. Note that "herbivore" includes the possibility of also being extensively insectivorous, whereas "insectivore" implies that herbivory is not a major component of the diet.
See lineage for more details or refer to: 
Franklin DC. 2008. Report 9: The waterbirds of Australian tropical rivers and wetlands. In A Compendium of Ecological Information on Australia’s Northern Tropical Rivers. Sub-project 1 of Australia’s Tropical Rivers – an integrated data assessment and analysis (DET18). A report to Land & Water Australia, ed. GP Lukacs, CM Finlayson. National Centre for Tropical Wetland Research: Townsville.
Note: Metadata not published in Australian Spatial Data Directory (ASDD) as of October 2009- No ANZLIC Unique Identifier assigned.

Organization: Australian Government Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water