Imperilled birds and First Peoples’ land and sea Country in Australia

ABSTRACT

For First Peoples across Australia, birds have important connections to kin and Country. We draw on a recent analysis of all Australia’s threatened bird taxa to identify on whose traditional Country they occur. Of the 201 imperilled (threatened or Near Threatened) bird taxa facing threats within Australian territory (including Commonwealth waters and offshore islands), 64% occur on lands and waters to which at least 463 First Peoples’ groups have a connection. Fourteen bird taxa occur only on Country of a single First Peoples’ group while 15 taxa occur on Country of over 50 First Peoples’ groups. Four First Peoples’ groups, in north Queensland and south-eastern Australia, have over 20 imperilled bird taxa on their Country. Taxa on First Peoples’ Country face 78% of the total national threat load on imperilled birds and have 75% of both the research and management needs for relieving threats. All the threats are a consequence of colonisation, suggesting that supporting First Peoples to manage the threats to birds is a moral, and potentially legal, responsibility. Many First Peoples have chosen to engage actively in the conservation of imperilled species but there are numerous additional opportunities for monitoring and active management of Country that will yield benefits. Our analysis can help First Peoples identify which birds on their Country are listed as threatened under western conventions and that they may wish to help conserve; and assist conservation managers to identify First Peoples who might wish to lead or become more involved in imperilled bird management.

POLICY HIGHLIGHTS

• The Global Biodiversity Framework strongly supports maximising the involvement of First Peoples in environmental management.

• There are at least 460 First Peoples’ groups on which imperilled birds occur, which provides a wide range of opportunities for management if people so choose.

• The Countries of many First Peoples’ groups supports 10 or more imperilled bird taxa, suggesting that support for Country management will often benefit many taxa.

• The depth and longevity of First Peoples’ connection to Country provides them with a perspective lacking in much management.

• Because all threats to imperilled birds on First Peoples’ Country are derived from settlers, there is a moral, and possible legal, case for supporting First Peoples to manage them.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
• traditional owners
• fire management
• invasive species
• monitoring
• threat load

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge all First Peoples and Traditional Owners of the Country on which the birds from this study are based and are grateful to all First Peoples for their immense contribution to the knowledge and conservation of Australia’s birds. First Peoples’ knowledge of native Australian birds, their lifecycles and habitat needs is profound and continues to make substantial contributions to the conservation management of many species. We are grateful to all bird experts for contributing knowledge to the Action Plan for Australian Birds 2020, many of whom have contributed to past editions. We are immensely grateful to the volunteers and birdwatchers who have spent their time and money to survey birds across Australia and contribute to the atlases of birds in Australia, and more recently Birdata (managed by BirdLife Australia) to help us understand how species populations are going. Financial support for that project was received from the Australian Bird Environment Fund, BirdLife Australia, Charles Darwin University, Biosis Pty Ltd, Auchmeddan and the Wettenhall Environment Trust.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/01584197.2023.2290008.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

¹ Language and terminology protocols in this paper: We use the term ‘First Peoples’ for Indigenous Peoples living in Australia but ‘Indigenous Peoples’ for those living in other countries or where the term is used in formal documentation. We use lower-case ‘people’ when referring to First Peoples individuals but, when referring to groups, capitalise the first letters of First Peoples, Indigenous and Traditional Owner to show respect for the diversity of cultures and languages that are captured within the term (e.g. like F in French; see Garnett et al. 2018).

² The names of the First Nations groups on whose Country this species occurs have been withheld at their request. For this reason it is also absent from Supplementary Table S1.