Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L01094:body:0:p22
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L01094
Segment Type: other
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Character Range: 65257–68224

nests (Smith et al. 2016).

Additionally, there has been a significant change in bird populations across Australia (BirdLife Australia 2015), and there are knowledge gaps in terms of the impacts of these changes on predation and competition of native and introduced bird species. Common starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) have been documented evicting swift parrots from hollows and breaking their eggs (Stojanovic et al. 2020), and the same could apply to forty-spotted pardalotes.

Other introduced species may also prey upon forty-spotted pardalotes. For example, western honey bees (Apis mellifera) have been recorded killing nestlings of swift parrots in the process of usurping hollows (Stojanovic et al. 2014).

3.2.10 General recreation
Recreational access and use of land and water can result in disturbance to native birds, leading to breeding failure, avoidance and abandonment of habitat, and significant energetic and physiological impacts related to disturbed feeding and roosting (Taylor & Knight 2003; Banks & Bryant 2007). Human activity, noise and other habitat disturbances may be contributing to forty-spotted pardalote declines in urban and public use areas, for example at Peter Murrell Reserves (Bryant 2010).

Of particular concern is the potential for over-use of call playback to disrupt breeding and foraging activity. Forty-spotted pardalotes are highly sought by bird watchers and photographers (T Cochran & A Hingston 2022. pers comm 10 January), some of whom attempt to attract the birds into the open by playing conspecific calls, which has the potential to disrupt breeding and foraging activities (Woinarski & Bulman 1985). While tourism undertaken in a controlled way may have minimal impact on the species, ad-hoc and nature guided tours that do not consider their disturbance to forty-spotted pardalotes pose additional threats to the species. The use of call playback to increase the likelihood of sighting the species is of additional concern as it can draw birds away from their feeding and breeding activities to defend their territories from perceived invaders. Both Bruny and Maria Islands are seeing significantly increased tourism much of which is nature based, with viewing forty‑spotted pardalotes one of the major draw cards.

3.3 Threat prioritisation
Each of the threats outlined above has been assessed to determine the risk posed to the forty-spotted pardalote using a risk matrix. This in turn determines the priority for actions outlined below. The threats were considered in the context of the current management regimes. The impact of each threat has been assessed assuming that existing management measures continue to be applied appropriately. If management regimes change then the level of risk associated with threats may also change.

The risk matrix considers the likelihood of an incident occurring and the consequences of that incident. Threats may act differently in different parts of the species range and