Merryn Pryor, the Birdlife coordinator for the Great Cocky Count led the workshop, held at the CRC Gallery Room, with 25 people attending to hear the latest on Black Cockatoos and the count.
There are three species of Black Cockatoo in the Southwest of Western Australia: Carnaby’s and Baudin’s White-tailed Black Cockatoo and the Forest Red-tailed Black Cockatoo. Merryn described how to identify each species and how to differentiate between male and female. She then talked on their threat status, distribution, feeding, habitat and breeding. There is greatest concern for Baudin’s which is likely to have its status upgraded to “Critically Endangered” in the near future.
The Great Cockatoo Count is planned for Sunday 3 April between 5:30 and 7:30pm. The strategy is to count the birds as they arrive at their night roost and to count any that leave! There haven’t been many roosting sites identified around Denmark and Merryn was encouraging people to report any new sites to her so that they can then be allocated to the count volunteers. This is an excellent opportunity to get involved in one of the major citizen science projects in Western Australia. If you would like to report a roost site contact Merryn at greatcockycount@birdlife.org.au or if you would like to register to take part in the count go to
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd_OMQpn7ACGMX1zm53hdZSFjn2TbCStEfPrtyTY51mgogGnQ/viewform
