Small woodland-dependent birds

Richness

moderate and falling for woodland specialists

Richness of all birds is not the same as specialist richness. Generalists can keep a list long while the assemblage simplifies.

Composition

shift toward Noisy Miner and urban-tolerant species

Composition change is the primary signal, not total count.

Abundance

relative detection frequency of small woodland birds down ~31%

Index, not density. Effort held roughly constant.

Occupancy

specialists contracting to larger remnants

Mulgoa retains more of the assemblage than Castlereagh or Prospect.

Persistence

Varied Sittella not recorded 2024–2026 at two former sites

Non-detection with stable effort is a signal, not proof of local extinction.

Functional diversity

bark-foraging and understorey insectivores thinning

Functional loss can precede species-list collapse.

Structural diversity

midstorey and fallen timber uneven; olive shading at edges

LandSentinel structure ≠ biological strata in use.

Native integrity

native canopy present; understorey increasingly transformed at edges

Native trees do not guarantee a native assemblage.

Invasion

African Olive expanding; Common Myna at urban interface

Invasive pressure is a dimension, not a single pest score.

Connectivity response

movement of specialists between remnants is poorly evidenced

Gap-crossing is inferred, not tracked.

Reproduction

insufficient evidence

Detection is not breeding. No nest-success dataset in this MVP.

Resilience

structural restoration has not yet produced specialist return

Recovery is a persistence test, not a planting count.