Ecotourist activity, noise and its effects on the avian community

Understanding how seasonal tourism affects animal communities is crucial to maintaining a balance between conservation and one of Australia’s most important economic sectors. While there has been increased focus on how anthropogenic activities impact bird communities in the scientific literature, these studies have mainly targeted urban areas and hiking trails rather than ecotourist ‘hot spots’. Here, I report initial results of a study focused on one of Australia’s most popular ecotourist destinations, which is also an Important Protected Area for birds. Here, human activity fluctuates significantly throughout the year, with peak periods overlapping with breeding seasons for many birds. I used passive automated recorders to quantify how variable levels of human occupancy and activity might impact bird communities, especially singing behaviour through both time and space in the vicinity of this popular resort. These findings will help us more fully understand how ecotourism might impact local biodiversity, and enable us to find solutions for the co-existence of ecotourist structures/activities and local bird life.