Breeding diets of the Little Eagle Hieraaetus morphnoides and Wedge-tailed Eagle Aquila audax in the Australian Capital Territory in 2011–2019

Debus, Stephen; Olsen, Jerry; Trost, Susan; Fuentes, Esteban

doi:10.20938/afo38019028

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…Given that body size usually correlates with life history ‘speed’ 110 , this negative correlation between urbanisation and eagle occurrence might have a similar explanation to the one reported for Golden Eagles 108 , 111 . Wedge-tailed Eagles usually nest several kilometres away from human developments 105 , 108 , 112 , while White-bellied Sea-Eagles can occasionally nest within urban green space 113 using forested zones scattered throughout the metropolitan area 114 . However, from a global perspective, larger raptors are not always urban avoiders: in South Africa, for example, Crowned Eagles ( Stephanoaetus coronatus ) feed on urban exploiters such as the Rock Hyrax ( Procavia capensis ), Hadeda Ibis ( Bostricia hagedash ) nestlings, and Vervet Monkeys ( Chlorocebus pygerythrus ) which support a large urban breeding population of Crowned Eagles in Durban and Pietermaritzberg 115 .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Smaller Australian raptors have greater urban tolerance

Headland

Colombelli‐Négrel

Callaghan

et al. 2023

Sci Rep

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Urbanisation is occurring around the world at a rapid rate and is generally associated with negative impacts on biodiversity at local, regional, and global scales. Examining the behavioural response profiles of wildlife to urbanisation helps differentiate between species that do or do not show adaptive responses to changing landscapes and hence are more or less likely to persist in such environments. Species-specific responses to urbanisation are poorly understood in the Southern Hemisphere compared to the Northern Hemisphere, where most of the published literature is focussed. This is also true for raptors, despite their high diversity and comparably high conservation concern in the Southern Hemisphere, and their critical role within ecosystems as bioindicators of environmental health. Here, we explore this knowledge gap using community science data sourced from eBird to investigate the urban tolerance of 24 Australian raptor species at a continental scale. We integrated eBird data with a global continuous measure of urbanisation, artificial light at night (ALAN), to derive an urban tolerance index, ranking species from positive to negative responses according to their tolerance of urban environments. We then gathered trait data from the published literature to assess whether certain traits (body mass, nest substrate, habitat type, feeding guild, and migratory status) were associated with urban tolerance. Body size was negatively associated with urban tolerance, as smaller raptors had greater urban tolerance than larger raptors. Out of the 24 species analysed, 13 species showed tolerance profiles for urban environments (positive response), and 11 species showed avoidance profiles for urban environments (negative response). The results of this study provide impetus to conserve native habitat and improve urban conditions for larger-bodied raptor species to conserve Australian raptor diversity in an increasingly urbanised world.

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