A pair of hooded plovers standing in shallow water
The IBA is an important area for hooded plovers.

The Melaleuca to Birchs Inlet Important Bird Area comprises a 2315 km2 section of coast and sub-coastal land in South West Tasmania. It stretches southward from the southern end of Birchs Inlet (where it adjoins the North-west Tasmanian Coast Important Bird Area), encompasses Melaleuca and Port Davey, and extends to Louisa Bay on the coast facing the Maatsuyker Island group. The area is rugged, with extensive beaches and coastal plains rising to rocky mountains. It contains a mosaic of temperate rainforest, eucalypt forest, moorland and buttongrass plains.[1]

Birds

It has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area (IBA) because it supports the entire breeding population of the critically endangered orange-bellied parrot. It also supports over 1% of the world populations of pied and sooty oystercatchers, and hooded plovers, as well as populations of most of Tasmania's endemic bird species.[2] The buttongrass plains support eastern ground parrots.[1]

Orange-bellied parrot

References

  1. ^ a b BirdLife International. (2011). Important Bird Areas factsheet: Melaleuca to Birchs Inlet. Downloaded from "BirdLife International - conserving the world's birds". Archived from the original on 10 July 2007. Retrieved 29 March 2014. on 14/08/2011.
  2. ^ "IBA: Melaleuca to Birchs Inlet". Birdata. Birds Australia. Archived from the original on 6 July 2011. Retrieved 14 August 2011.

43°08′34″S 145°54′51″E / 43.14278°S 145.91417°E / -43.14278; 145.91417


Categories