Birders on alert in Australia as first cases of deadly avian influenza confirmed in two migratory pelagic species

Brown Skua: photo Liam Quinn via Wikimedia Commons

                                    

UP until late last month , Australia's birds had been spared the H5N1 strain of avian influenza that has caused so much devastation to wildlife in Britain and elsewhere since 2021.

But on June 22, a case was confirmed in a Brown Skua found on a beach on Western Australia's southern coastline.

Two days later, not far away, the same fate fate befell a Giant Petrel.

Both have since died.

There are fears that other birds - seen in a sickly state of health - may also have contracted the disease.

Scientists and poultry farmers are now on high alert amid worries not just for Australia's bird population but for all that in Antarctica.                                 

Giant Petrel: photo Jerzy Strzelecki via Wikimedia Commons