Ecosure has just released a regional bird flu preparedness plan for the Northern Great Barrier Reef, covering the coast from Cape York down to Townsville, on behalf of the Queensland Government. It maps out the birds and sites most worth watching, and it lists our own Barnard Island Group and Sister Islands, just offshore from Mission Beach, as a priority site thanks to the seabird colonies they support.
The species flagged as highest risk in our region include a few we all know well:
- Southern Cassowary
- Eastern Curlew
- Curlew Sandpiper
- Black-tailed Godwit
- Common Greenshank
- Herald Petrel
- Buff-banded Rail (Coral Sea)
A step down but still on the watchlist locally are the terns and seabirds that nest in big colonies at Barnard Island, birds like Bridled Tern, Sooty Tern and Crested Tern, along with Brown Booby, Masked Booby and Wedge-tailed Shearwater further round the coast. Colony nesters like these are considered higher risk because the virus spreads fast when birds are packed in close together, which is part of why a plan like this exists for our patch specifically.
Download the full report here:
Where things stand
You may have seen the news that H5 bird flu has arrived in Australia. It’s been found in wild birds in WA, SA and NSW, and now Queensland too, with a dead seabird testing positive on Moreton Island in late July.
There’s no sign of it in poultry and no mass bird deaths here on the Cassowary Coast. But we live among an incredible amount of birdlife, shorebirds, waterbirds, raptors, cassowaries, so it’s worth all of us knowing what to watch for.
What a sick bird might look like:
- Can’t stand, walk or fly properly
- Looks droopy or puffed up
- Breathing heavily, sneezing or has a runny nose
- Head or neck held at an odd angle
- Several birds dying in the same spot around the same time
Some infected birds show no signs at all, so a cluster of deaths is often the biggest clue.
If you spot it:
- Don’t touch the bird, and keep kids and pets away
- Snap a photo or video if you can do so safely
- Call the Emergency Animal Disease Hotline, 1800 675 888, any time
Have this ready when you call:
- Where you found it (GPS pin, nearest road or landmark)
- When you found it (date and time)
- How many birds, and whether they look freshly dead or have been there a while
- What you saw, e.g. one bird or several, any of the signs above