Gunning District Bird of the Month for February – The White-fronted Chat
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| White-fronted Chat at Werribbee Treatment Plant: Image courtesy Russell Cockman http://www.russellsastronomy.com |
Gunning District History Society [GDHS] holds a copy of Gladstone’s bird list transcribed by his son John. These articles will highlight some of the things Gladstone recorded, try to place them in context and see if we can glean any lessons about the recent history of our district.
Photo of Gladstone at right courtesy of his son Wayne Weatherstone.
The White-fronted Chat
No further sightings were recorded until 21 November 1980 when he wrote “Two White-fronted Chats seen here today. Rare visitors in this area.” Gladstone felt this visit sufficiently important to underline his record.
Left: Painting of a White-fronted Chat by Mel Hills, based on a photo by Alan Fletcher. Courtesy Mel Hills. https://www.melhelhillswildart.com.au/
The Rare Visitor
As it was in Gladstone’s time, so it is today. The recently updated “Birds of the Upper Lachlan Shire” on the Council website lists the White-fronted Chat as a rare visitor here. So rare in fact that Gladstone, who had been paying close attention to local birdlife since 1941, only saw his first bird on Lyndfield Park in 1976. Why might this be so? Does it tell us anything about the district? Or about the bird? Let us see.
Bird of Many Names
Australian Museum research scientist Dr Richard Major, speaking on ABC Radio National's Off Track program, said this little bird (half the size of a sparrow) was common and very widespread in the 1800s and early 1900s. Its range included large urban areas like Sydney.
The fact that the White-fronted Chat was known in many different places in the past led to it being a bird of many names. According to Ian Fraser in his “Australian Bird Names – A Complete Guide” – it has been variously known as the Tintack, Banded Tintack, Clipper, Tripper, Nun, White-fronted Nun, Dotterel. Moonbird, Moon Bumps, Ringlet, Ringneck, Thistlebird and White-fronted Epthianura.
Above Right: Female White-fronted Chat collecting nesting material. Image courtesy Russell Cockman http://www.russellsastronomy.com
The Ideal Home for a White-fronted Chat
Although they are classified as honeyeaters and have the same brush-tipped tongues as other members of this family, White-fronted Chats do not feed on nectar. Instead, they run along the ground feeding on insects. Often in small groups of up to around 20, they congregate wherever they find good sources of midges, kelp-flies, plant bugs, aphids and beetles.
They particularly like damp and salty habitats. Small groups of them inhabit moist open areas including saltmarshes, coastal dunes, edges of marshlands and samphire flats. These chats are much less evident now than they were up until the early 1900s. Dr Major says they are not among the winners from modern urbanisation. Much of their habitat has fallen victim to development and he feels they are not able to cope well with disturbances by humans.
The Gunning district has a lot of wide open and sparely populated areas outside the villages. However, it is not noted for its extensive damp areas – and, at the time of writing, many of our moist places are thoroughly dried out. We also certainly have some salty soils. In the recent past, these saline soils were often damp. There were some very good annual rainfall years in the mid 1970s which may explain why the chats Gladstone saw chose 1976 as a good year to visit.
Dryland Salinity
Our salty soils arise from dryland salinity - the buildup of salt in the surface soil as a result of a rising water table and groundwater seepage. Some of these salts are carried inland from the ocean by rain. Others are weathering salts which come from the breakdown of soil and rock. A third source is fossil salts laid down in ancient marine sediments. |
| Above: “An Ordovician Extinction”. Wikimedia Commons |
Much of the geology of our district is made up of Ordovician sedimentary rock up to 500 million years old. Difficult though it is to imagine today, the hill country of the Mundoonen and Midgee Ranges was formed by ancient Ordovician rock.
The extent to which dryland salinity manifests itself is largely a function of rainfall – lots of rain causes groundwater to rise towards the soil surface carrying salts with it. Our mismanagement of the landscape also contributes. The removal of deep rooted perennial native trees, shrubs and grasses and their replacement with more shallow rooted annual plants, results in more leakage of water past the root zone and into the groundwater causing it to rise.
Dryland salinity is a serious problem that has affected many parts of Australia including our district here. It continues to damage our environment and reduce the productivity of our land today – but is not at the forefront of our consciousness as it once was.
An overall wet decade in the 70’s caused water tables to rise. Dryland salinity began to raise its head again in the 80’s and 90’s. During the 90’s and first half of the 2000 decade government authorities, landcare groups and farmers were combining to fight the salinity problem as a priority. They did this by planting trees on breaks of slope to take up water moving beneath the surface and planting salt tolerant perennial grasses on visible salt scalds. While dryland salinity has not gone away, the current extended very hot and dry conditions have pushed the water table back down to the depths. For now, affected land is not so obvious and people are less conscious of the problem.
Will We See These Rare Visitors Back Again?
Above left: White-fronted Chat © Gary King 2019 birdlifephotography.com.au
The species has undergone a 36 % decline nationally between 1980 and 2000 and, as a result, it is now listed as ‘Vulnerable’ in NSW. In some local areas, such as the Greater Sydney Region, they have been declared an Endangered Species.
Small isolated communities of these birds can survive in patches of good habitat and we can see this in our region. Local ornithologist Dr Tony Saunders says a pair was seen regularly from 2000 to 2010 at Dalton in an area of exposed dryland salinity but they have not been recorded there more recently. Between 5 and 20 birds have been seen regularly around Mummel although not every year.
Greening Australia’s bird expert Nicki Taws notes that these chats have been seen on the shorelines of Lakes George and Bathurst. They have also become more common in the ACT at the Arboretum and new suburbs near Mt Stromlo where new dams and the development of marshy shorelines have favoured them.
Although the White-fronted Chat is not lost to us their numbers are small. Further, they find it hard to move to new areas which Dr Major’s research shows is a problem for them. There is often not enough linking vegetation to allow them to rest during long travels. We can do something about that. Planting tree corridors, and even scatterings of individual paddock trees will help birds like the White-fronted Chat. Increasing the extent of shrub layers and deep-rooted perennial grasses in our farm and home plantings also helps as they offer good protection from predators.
While water tables are currently sinking lower and lower, it is still worthwhile to pay attention to saline areas. Whether visibly damp or dry, saline soils are a blight on the landscape, reducing native biodiversity on land and in waterways as well as sapping productivity.
Certainly, if Gladstone were alive today, there can be no doubt he would be out urging us all to take action now – to provide better outcomes for birds, agriculture and people.
Further Information
Whether you are on the land or live in town, there are ways you can make your place look better, be more productive and help many wildlife species including the White-fronted Chat. Good first points of contact if you would like to enquire further about this are:• South East Local Land Services or enquiry.southeast@lls.nsw.gov.au
• https://upperlachlanlandcare.org.au/ or 0447 242 474 or coordinator@upperlachlanlandcare.org.au
• https://gunningdistrictlandcare.org.au/ or 0488 027 653 or coordinator@gunningdistrictlandcare.org.au
• For gardeners – A Google search will bring you a plethora of books on how to create a wildlife friendly garden. Perhaps start with Habitat: A practical guide to creating a wildlife-friendly Australian garden by AB Bishop
• http://www.birdsinbackyards.net/
• For a good guide on what you can do about dryland salinity go to https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/-/media/OEH/Corporate-Site/Documents/Land-and-soil/guidelines-managing-salinity-rural-areas-150241.pdf
• A short biography of Gladstone Weatherstone is available as a PDF file from bobgunninghistoryblog@gmail.com. You can also obtain the first article in this series from the same email address or go to https://gunninghistory.blogspot.com/2020/01/from-gladstones-notebook-gunning.html
References
Conservation ecology of the White-fronted Chat - a declining bird in an endangered ecological community: A project undertaken at the Australian Museum and supervised by Richard Major and Rebecca Johnson. http://www.hermonslade.org.au/hsf_09_3/LANDWATERLIFE Jerrawa Creek Catchment Renewal Plan 2010-2020
“Australian Bird Names – A Complete Guide” Ian Fraser E book edition.
“The Australian Bird Guide” Peter Menkhorst et al. CSIRO Publishing
“Birds of the Upper Lachlan Shire” Dr Tony Saunders. https://www.upperlachlan.nsw.gov.au
Thank You
Thank you to:Nikki Taws of Greening Australia;
Dr Tony Saunders of the Crookwell Native Flora and Fauna Club;
Fiona Leech, Senior Land Service Officer (Mixed Farming Systems), South East Local Land Services.
Fiona, Tony and Nikki reviewed drafts of this article and contributed helpful improvements. Any sillinesses or shortcomings you might find are down to me.
Thank you also to John Weatherstone for providing a transcription of Gladstone’s Notebook and fielding lots of follow up questions about Gladstone related matters.
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