Hi, I'm looking for advice on the foraging habits of Little Corella in their native lands, with a particular emphasis on pruning, stripping and preferred foods at that location.
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Hi John.
Firstly, I'm not what I & a lot of other folk would call an expert but I've gleaned a certain amount from observations & reading.
The Little Corella is naturally a bird of the drier interior of Australia. It's spread is due to human agriculture making grain readily available as a food source.
In their natural habitats they feed on native grass seeds, legumes & Acacia seeds. In fact, they prefer native grass seeds to the seeds of grain crops where the former are available. This has implications for management of Little Corella populations in towns where they're considered to be a nuisance.
The stripping of bark & pruning is probably related to the birds seeking stimulation as life could become boring for an intelligent creature like the Little Corella sitting on a branch all day.
Little Corellas strip leaves from trees & use the leaves to line their nests. They also chew the inside of their nesting hollows to provide new litter for the nest. In fact, trees can suffer significant damage, if not death, from repeated chewing of the hollows over a number of years.
Little Corellas will also chew out other hollows as well as the one they plan to use in a current year. This may be preparation of new nesting sites.
Much of the above information is from the Reader's Digest Complete Book of Australian Birds but I've also observed Little Corella behaviour in Strathalbyn in SA where there are grain silos as well as on my own property where they eat a variety of Acacia seeds & the fruits of indigenous ground covers.
It's interesting to note that the Alexandrina Council in SA has taken no notice of the above information, in spite of it being drawn to its attention, when trying to fruitlessly & wastefully manage Little Corella numbers in Strathalbyn over the last 30 years. One wonders which is the more intelligent creature, the Little Corella or the Alexandrina Council.
Thanks
Regarding the wholesale stripping of leaves and stems, what would you say is a feature of their native habitat that causes this to happen?
It's not usually the case that a species will engage in wanton destruction of habitat. There's only one species that I can think of that does this. So wholesale stripping of leaves & stems probably relates to something missing from the environment. It might be that a particular resource normally used by the Little Corellas has been removed causing the behaviour of the birds to be redirected to wholesale destruction. Restoration of that resource might be the measure required to prevent the wholesale stripping - assuming this is what you would like to do.
The two resources that might apply in this case are trees with nesting hollows & native grasses. Nesting hollows are disappearing to make way for human primary production, houses & tourist resorts & native grasses have been largely replaced by pasture grasses & grain crops. If these resources were restored to some degree wholesale stripping behaviour might be redirected to nest preparation & seed eating.
On the other hand it might be the case that wholesale stripping is nature's way of controlling populations of particular tree species in particular landscapes or environments.
I must admit to being curious about your curiosity on this topic. And I'm interested in the thoughts of other Birds in Backyarders.
I see lots of different species of parrots at my place. I think trying to explain all their strange behaviour is pretty futile, they do lots of weird things.
Yes, the question isn't taken seriously. Quite obviously knowing the answer would help to not only understand their behaviour but also suggest better ways of diverting them.
The first response of healthy trees like gums is to regrow and produce more pods with seed, so as you say it might be a case of simply not having something, or enough of something to eat that they had in their home range.
I certainly also observe them seeking out clover in parks, which is often a minor component of 'grass'.
John, if you're still monitoring this thread you might find this interesting: http://www.alexandrina.sa.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/Discovery%20Circle%20Little%20Corellas%20Report.pdf
And perhaps I've been rather harsh on the Alexandrina Council. I note from its website that, after 30 years, council is now tending towards including habitat modification in its Little Corella management strategies.