Flagship Species: Diamond Firetail

The Diamond Firetail Stagonopleura guttata, is a brightly coloured finch that occupies open eucalypt Box-Gum woodlands where there is a grassy understorey.

Diamond firetailFiretails build bottle-shaped nests in trees and bushes, and forage on the ground, largely for grass seeds and other plant material, but also for insects. They are found in grassy eucalypt woodlands and are usually encountered in flocks of between 5 to 40 birds, occasionally more. They breed between August and January. Their conservation status is vulnerable under the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act, 1995.

Habitat Requirements – Home and Food

Diamond Firetails are among 46 native birds recorded on Charles Sturt University land in 2012. The majority of species were observed along Hawthornden Creek which has a number of favourable habitat features, including mature old growth eucalypt trees, tall seeding grasses, dense cover provided by plantings of Acacia rubida, surrounding open space and paddocks, and a supply of water in the creek.

The mature native trees along Hawthornden Creek provide a corridor for Diamond Firetails to move through the landscape. The creek provides a link between the relatively large Box-Gum woodland remnants in the Boundary Road Reserve and south of Mount Panorama, and the Macquarie River. This species are granivorous meaning they eat seeds. They feed exclusively on the ground, on grass, herb seeds and green leaves, and on insects (especially during the breeding season)

Threats

  • Vegetation clearance and fragmentation of habitat.
  • Isolation and reductions in remnant area inhibit dispersal and increase their vulnerability to local extinction. Small, isolated populations are prone to losing their long-term genetic viability (Barrett et al. 1994).
  • Diamond Firetail populations appear unable to persist in areas which lack remnants of native vegetation larger than 200ha (N. Schrader, pers. comm.).
  • Habitat degradation, particularly overgrazing of the grass understorey, weeds and pest animals.
  • Increased abundance of predators such as Pied Currawongs and Australian Ravens may increase nest predation in fragmented woodland remnants (Major et al. 1996)."