Lesley Brooker

Last updated

Lesley Brooker
OccupationCSIRO
Known forOrnithology

Lesley Brooker is an Australian ornithologist based in Western Australia following retirement from a career with the CSIRO's Division of Wildlife Research. There she worked, as a database manager and computer modeller, on developing methodologies for the re-design and restoration of agricultural lands for bird conservation. Since then, she has collaborated with her husband Michael Brooker in studies on cuckoo evolution, population ecology of fairy-wrens [1] and spatial dynamics of birds in fragmented landscapes. [2]

Contents

Awards

In 2004 she was awarded the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union's D.L. Serventy Medal which recognizes excellence in published work on birds in the Australasian region.[ citation needed ]

Career

Brooker has contributed to ornithological research in Australia, in various states across Australia, including Western Australia, and Queensland, as well as researching and publishing on Explorers, as well as biodiversity, for over thirty years. [3] [4] Her work involved research on Wedge-Tailed Eagles, Blue-breasted Fairy wrens [5] [6] and ecosystem connectivity. [7] Booker was also a trip leader for the Western Australian Branch of Birdlife Australia and contributed to the Birds in the Great Western Woodlands, a joint project between BirdLife Australia and The Nature Conservancy [8]

Brooker has also contributed to research on paternity of bird families, in Molecular Ecology. [9]

She has published on animal dispersals, and habitat quality, on corridor use and connectivity. [10] Brooker served on the Emu advisory committee. [3]

Selected works [11]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Superb fairywren</span> Species of bird

The superb fairywren is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae, and is common and familiar across south-eastern Australia. It is a sedentary and territorial species, also exhibiting a high degree of sexual dimorphism; the male in breeding plumage has a striking bright blue forehead, ear coverts, mantle, and tail, with a black mask and black or dark blue throat. Non-breeding males, females and juveniles are predominantly grey-brown in colour; this gave the early impression that males were polygamous, as all dull-coloured birds were taken for females. Six subspecies groups are recognized: three larger and darker forms from Tasmania, Flinders and King Island respectively, and three smaller and paler forms from mainland Australia and Kangaroo Island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union</span> Bird research organisation

The Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU), now part of BirdLife Australia, was Australia's largest non-government, non-profit, bird conservation organisation. It was founded in 1901 to promote the study and conservation of the native bird species of Australia and adjacent regions, making it Australia's oldest national birding association. In 1996, the organisation adopted the trading name of Birds Australia for most public purposes, while retaining its original name for legal purposes and as the publisher of its journal, the Emu. In 2012, the RAOU merged with Bird Observation & Conservation Australia to form BirdLife Australia.

James Harding was a British-Australian pastoralist and explorer in colonial Western Australia. While exploring in the Kimberley region in 1864, he was killed by Aboriginal Australians. In February 1913, a monument to Panter, Harding, Goldwyer and Brown, the Explorers' Monument, was unveiled in Fremantle.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frederick Clause</span>

Frederick Rushbrook Clause was a naval surgeon, an early explorer in Western Australia and an artist.

Charles Fraser or Frazer or Frazier was Colonial Botanist of New South Wales from 1821 to 1831. He collected and catalogued numerous Australian plant species, and participated in a number of exploring expeditions. He was a member of the Stirling expedition of 1827, and his report on the quality of the soil was instrumental in the decision to establish the Swan River Colony.

Dominic Louis Serventy was a Perth -based Western Australian ornithologist. He was president of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU) 1947–1949. He assisted with the initial organisation of the British Museum's series of Harold Hall Australian ornithological collecting expeditions during the 1960s, also participating in the third (1965) expedition.

Michael Brooker is an Australian ornithologist based in Western Australia following retirement from a career with the CSIRO's Division of Wildlife Research. There he worked on wedge-tailed eagles, fauna surveys, the environmental impact of wildfire and the conservation value of remnant patches of native vegetation. Since then he has collaborated with his wife Lesley Brooker in studies on cuckoo evolution, population ecology of fairy-wrens and spatial dynamics of birds in fragmented landscapes. In 2004 he was awarded, jointly with his wife Lesley, the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union's D.L. Serventy Medal which recognizes excellence in published work on birds in the Australasian region.

John Casimir Zichy Woinarski is an Australian ornithologist, mammalogist, and herpetologist. He was awarded the 2001 Eureka Prize for Biodiversity Research. In the same year he was the recipient of the D. L. Serventy Medal, awarded by the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union for outstanding published work on birds in the Australasian region.

Ian Cecil Robert Rowley was an Australian ornithologist of Scottish origin. He was born in Edinburgh and educated at Wellington College and Cambridge University. Following service in the Royal Navy during the second world war, he moved to Australia in 1949 and graduated in Agricultural Science from the University of Melbourne under the Commonwealth Reconstruction Training Scheme.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Penny Olsen</span> Australian ornithologist and author

Penelope Diane Olsen is an Australian ornithologist and author.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vincent Serventy</span> Australian author, ornithologist and conservationist

Vincent Noel Serventy AM was an Australian author, ornithologist and conservationist.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Splendid fairywren</span> Species of bird

The splendid fairywren is a passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is also known simply as the splendid wren or more colloquially in Western Australia as the blue wren. The splendid fairywren is found across much of the Australian continent from central-western New South Wales and southwestern Queensland over to coastal Western Australia. It inhabits predominantly arid and semi-arid regions. Exhibiting a high degree of sexual dimorphism, the male in breeding plumage is a small, long-tailed bird of predominantly bright blue and black colouration. Non-breeding males, females and juveniles are predominantly grey-brown in colour; this gave the early impression that males were polygamous as all dull-coloured birds were taken for females. It comprises several similar all-blue and black subspecies that were originally considered separate species.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eyrean grasswren</span> Species of bird

The Eyrean grasswren is a small grasswren from the Passerine family Maluridae. This is a cryptically plumaged and uncommon bird endemic to arid regions of Central Australia. The species was discovered by F.W. Andrews in 1874 around the Macumba River at Lake Eyre, and named after the South Australian Surveyor General George Woodroffe Goyder.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Purple-crowned fairywren</span> Species of songbird endemic to northern Australia in the family Maluridae

The purple-crowned fairywren is a species of bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is the largest of the eleven species in the genus Malurus and is endemic to northern Australia. The species name is derived from the Latin word cǒrōna meaning "crown", owing to the distinctive purple circle of crown feathers sported by breeding males. Genetic evidence shows that the purple-crowned fairywren is most closely related to the superb fairywren and splendid fairywren. Purple-crowned fairywrens can be distinguished from other fairywrens in northern Australia by the presence of cheek patches and the deep blue colour of their perky tails.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Red-backed fairywren</span> Passerine bird in the Australasian wren family

The red-backed fairywren is a species of passerine bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is endemic to Australia and can be found near rivers and coastal areas along the northern and eastern coastlines from the Kimberley in the northwest to the Hunter Region in New South Wales. The male adopts a striking breeding plumage, with a black head, upperparts and tail, and a brightly coloured red back and brown wings. The female has brownish upperparts and paler underparts. The male in eclipse plumage and the juvenile resemble the female. Some males remain in non-breeding plumage while breeding. Two subspecies are recognised; the nominate M. m.melanocephalus of eastern Australia has a longer tail and orange back, and the short-tailed M. m. cruentatus from northern Australia has a redder back.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mallee emu-wren</span> Species of bird

The mallee emu-wren is a species of bird in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is endemic to Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Buff-sided robin</span> Species of bird

The buff-sided robin is a small, diurnal, insectivorous, perching (passerine) bird in the family Petroicidae, a group commonly known as the Australo-Papuan or Australasian robins. It is also known as the buff-sided fly-robin, buff-sided shrike-robin and Isabellflankenschnäpper (German). The buff-sided robin is endemic to northern Australia, where it primarily occurs in riparian forests and monsoon vine thickets from the Kimberly region of Western Australia to the north-west Queensland Gulf of Carpentaria. The plumage of the adult birds is characterised by a dark hood and back with a prominent white stripe on the supercilium; a white throat, white wing and tail bars, and a striking buff to orange patch on the flank below the wings. Adult birds are not sexually dimorphic; however, males are generally larger and can be separated from females based on morphological measurements. Buff-sided robins predominantly take insects from the ground by sallying from an observational perch. Insect prey are also occasionally taken by hawking on the wing or by gleaning from the trunk or foliage of riparian vegetation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">BirdLife Australia</span> Australian bird conservation organization

Thomas Carter (1863–1931) was an English ornithologist active in Australia. He made large collections of bird specimens while living and working in remote regions of Western Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albert Frederick Calvert</span>

Albert Frederick Calvert (1872-1946) was an English author, engineer and explorer active in Australia.

References

  1. Brooker, Michael; Brooker, Lesley (1997). "Dispersal of the Blue-breasted Fairy-wren in fragmented habitat in the wheatbelt of Western Australia". Pacific Conservation Biology. 3 (3): 295–300. doi:10.1071/pc970295. ISSN   2204-4604.
  2. "Biodiversity - The Western Australian Naturalist reference - PDF".
  3. 1 2 "CSIRO".
  4. "Bird Survey" (PDF).
  5. "South Australian Ornithologist, Volume 39 - Birds SA". 1 February 2016. Retrieved 8 October 2023.
  6. Brooker, Michael; Brooker, Lesley (2001). "Breeding biology, reproductive success and survival of blue-breasted fairy-wrens in fragmented habitat in the Western Australian wheatbelt". Wildlife Research. 28 (2): 205–214. doi:10.1071/wr00012. ISSN   1448-5494.
  7. "Ornithology". academic.oup.com. Retrieved 7 October 2023.
  8. "Birdlife Report" (PDF).
  9. Brouwer, Lyanne; van de Pol, Martijn; Aranzamendi, Nataly Hidalgo; Bain, Glen; Baldassarre, Daniel T.; Brooker, Lesley C.; Brooker, Michael G.; Colombelli‐Négrel, Diane; Enbody, Erik; Gielow, Kurt; Hall, Michelle L.; Johnson, Allison E.; Karubian, Jordan; Kingma, Sjouke A.; Kleindorfer, Sonia (December 2017). "Multiple hypotheses explain variation in extra‐pair paternity at different levels in a single bird family". Molecular Ecology. 26 (23): 6717–6729. doi:10.1111/mec.14385. hdl:11343/293837. ISSN   0962-1083. PMID   29068511. S2CID   4871268.
  10. Brooker, Lesley; Brooker, Michael; Cale, Peter (27 March 1999). "Animal Dispersal in Fragmented Habitat: Measuring Habitat Connectivity, Corridor Use, and Dispersal Mortality". Ecology and Society. 3 (1). doi:10.5751/ES-00109-030104. hdl:10535/2810. ISSN   1708-3087.
  11. "Author: "Brooker, Lesley, 1942-" - Catalogue | National Library of Australia Search Results". catalogue.nla.gov.au. Retrieved 7 October 2023.
  12. "Expedition Eastward from Northam by Lesley Brooker (2006)" . Retrieved 7 October 2023.
  13. "Explorers routes revisted : Moore expeditions 1836 ; Drummond expeditions 1841-1842 / compiled and... - Catalogue | National Library of Australia". catalogue.nla.gov.au. Retrieved 7 October 2023.
  14. "Explorers Routes Revisited". www.hesperianpress.com. Retrieved 7 October 2023.
  15. "Explorers routes revisited : Giles 1875 expedition / compiled and edited by Lesley Brooker - Catalogue | National Library of Australia". catalogue.nla.gov.au. Retrieved 7 October 2023.

Olsen, Penny. (2005). D.L. Serventy Medal 2005: Citation. Lesley and Michael Brooker. Emu 105: 341.