As a kid in the 80s and 90s growing up in Melbs I never saw corellas. The first time I saw them was on a trip to the NT in 2000. Now they are everywhere in the burbs. Why?
Corellas the bird. Not Corollas the car.
Edit: location for these recent flocks in my experience: Cheltenham, Dandenong and Frankston. I’ve also seen a couple in the city on occasion. They just weren’t around when I was a kid.
Edit 2: this ABC article explains how they used to be inland birds until the 2000s/millennial drought.
Posted by giveitawaynever
12 Comments
I wouldn’t call them “everywhere in the burbs”. I might see two a year. Hardly common.
Would have depended on location in Melbourne. Some areas would have heaps of them, but some inner areas would not. I lived on the edge of the burbs and we had heaps of them and would see (and hear) them daily.
Maybe it’s because all the Plane trees they love eating the seeds off are at the right maturity?
Who else had to google what a corella was? I’ve definitely seen a lot more cockatoos in the past decade or so, their populations must be thriving.
Long billed and little corellas have significantly increased in numbers over the last twenty years, so it could just be that they were always around but just not in flocks large enough to notice?
They’re nomadic and follow seasonal routes for food, we get inundated in Port (like the whole of Williamstown Road is just thousands of cockatoos), and then a few days later they’ve stripped all the trees and a few window casings, and they fuck off. You might see a pair or small group from time to time but otherwise nothing until the next year.
While the corella population is going up, the corolla population seems to be going down!
It was in the news a few years back. Corellageddon!
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/little-flockers-corella-geddon-hits-melbourne-s-leafiest-suburbs-20180404-p4z7t5.html
TL;DR They are not native to the area but have been taking over.
You’re right. They came down during the big drought and stayed once they realised how much easy food there was.
You’re right. They came down during the big drought and stayed once they realised how much easy food there was.
Yes the past few years they’ve almost completely taken over Mornington in huge flocks. Many of the grassy areas where galahs used to inhabid are now just completely full of corellas
That’s so weird. I’m in St Kilda and there was a huge flock going from Plane tree to plane tree an I was trying to remember if this was normal.
Good. I fucking love corellas