Bush Stone-Curlew

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Bush Stone-curlew
Bush Stone-curlew
Bush Stone-curlew
Conservation status
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Charadriiformes
Family: Burhinidae
Genus: Burhinus
Species: B. grallarius
Binomial name
Burhinus grallarius
Latham, 1802

The Bush Stone-curlew (Burhinus grallarius) is a large, ground-dwelling bird endemic to Australia. Although it looks rather like a wader and is related to the oystercatchers, avocets and plovers, it is a dry-land predator: essentially a winged terrestrial carnivore.

Like most stone-curlews, it is mainly nocturnal and specialises in hunting small grassland animals: frogs, spiders, insects, molluscs, crustaceans, snakes, lizards and small mammals are all taken, mostly gleaned or probed from soft soil or rotting wood; also a few seeds or tubers, particularly in drought years. Birds usually forage individually or in pairs over a large home range, particularly on moonlit nights.

During the day, Bush Stone-curlews tend to remain inactive, sheltering amongst tall grass or low shrubs and relying on their cryptic plumage to protect them from their only natural predators: raptors. When disturbed, they freeze motionless, often in odd-looking postures. For visual predators like raptors (and humans), this works well, but it serves little purpose with introduced feral animals that hunt by scent: notably foxes.

Despite their ungainly appearance and habit of freezing motionless, they are sure-footed, fast and agile on the ground, and although they seldom fly during daylight hours, they are far from clumsy in the air; flight is rapid and direct on long, broad wings.

When threatened (presumably in the presence of a nest), they may raise their wings wide and high in an impressive threat posture and emit a loud hoarse hissing noise.

Contents

[edit] Conservation Status

Adult facial markings
Adult facial markings

Bush Stone-curlews remain reasonably common in the north of Australia, but have become rare in the more fertile south. Many experts believe that fox predation is a prime factor in their decline, however there are areas where foxes are common yet the Bush Stone-curlew population remains healthy, so the true causes remain uncertain. Large-scale habitat destruction and fragmentation has undoubtedly been important, and may well be the major factor.

[edit] Australia

Bush Stone Curlew are not listed as threatened on the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.

[edit] New South Wales

Bush Stone Curlew are considered to be endangered in New South Wales under the Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995.

Pair
Pair

[edit] Victoria

  • Bush Stone Curlew are listed as threatened on the Victorian Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act 1988.[1] Under this Act, an Action Statement for the recovery and future management of this species has been prepared.[2]
  • On the 2007 advisory list of threatened vertebrate fauna in Victoria, this species is listed as endangered.[3]
Chicks in cryptic pose
Chicks in cryptic pose


Adult & young, Rush Creek, SE Queensland
Adult & young, Rush Creek, SE Queensland


[edit] References

  1. ^ Department of Sustainability and Environment, Victoria
  2. ^ Department of Sustainability and Environment, Victoria
  3. ^ Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment (2007). Advisory List of Threatened Vertebrate Fauna in Victoria - 2007. East Melbourne, Victoria: Department of Sustainability and Environment, 15. ISBN 978-1-74208-039-0. 
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