The destruction of northern jarrah forests in Western Australia for bauxite mining will drive a threatened black cockatoo species “to and beyond the brink of extinction” if it is allowed to continue, conservationists have warned.

Mark Henryon, a volunteer with BirdLife Western Australia, said there was a stark choice to be made regarding the survival of the endangered Baudin’s black cockatoo. “Baudin’s or bauxite – we can’t have both,” he said.

Henryon has spent years campaigning for stronger protections for what he describes as the state’s “forgotten” black cockatoo.

The dark-feathered, white-cheeked bird, with a call resembling a squeaky gate, is found only in the south-west of the state.

Unlike the better-known Carnaby’s black cockatoo, the Baudin’s has a longer, narrower bill, which Henryon said it uses like a surgical instrument to extract seeds from marri nuts without breaking them open.

In 2023, BirdLife WA nominated the species to be “uplisted” to critically endangered under state law, after research revealed its population had declined by 90% over the past 40 years.

The change would have aligned the species’ conservation status with international bodies such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which already lists the Baudin’s as critically endangered.

However, the state’s threatened species scientific committee rejected the nomination, citing a lack of sufficient data.

Conservationists now fear the species is facing even greater pressure due to planned expansions of bauxite mining in the northern jarrah forests.

US aluminium giant Alcoa has submitted two proposals to extend its bauxite mining operations, which would result in the clearing of more than 11,000 hectares of forest — roughly equivalent to bulldozing Perth’s Kings Park more than 27 times over.

Meanwhile, metals company South32 has received approval from both state and federal governments to clear over 3,800 hectares for the expansion of its Worsley Alumina bauxite mine.

Baudin’s black cockatoos depend on old trees and natural hollows in the northern jarrah forests of the Darling Range, south-east of Perth, as their primary winter habitat.

Most of the state’s Baudin’s population breeds in the far south-west and migrates north each year between March and September to forage in these forests.

Mining companies in the region have a long history of what the Conservation Council of WA describes as “strip mining” – completely clearing sections of forest to access the bauxite beneath.

“I’ve seen images of football fields-worth of clearing, and there will be one tree left,” Matt Roberts, the council’s executive director, said.

Roberts said to secure the Baudin’s future, “we need to end mining in forests and [the] clearing of forests for mining”.

“These tree hollows can take hundreds of years to develop. They’re in very old trees. They can’t be rehabilitated or brought back at the pace that the Baudin’s needs them to be.”

The state’s Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) recently opened Alcoa’s proposals for public consultation – the first opportunity in 60 years for the community to scrutinise the company’s operations in the area.

The EPA received more than 59,000 submissions, the highest number ever recorded through a consultation process. Almost 90% were template submissions, pre-written as part of an organised campaign, but the authority said the record response reflected the high level of public interest.

In its submission to the EPA, BirdLife WA warned that further mining in this global biodiversity hotspot would have “irreversible and catastrophic” consequences for Western Australia’s birdlife, including the Baudin’s, Carnaby’s and forest red-tailed black cockatoos.

The organisation stated that the Baudin’s black cockatoo would become functionally extinct within 50 years – or sooner – if the proposed expansions proceed.

It said much of the planned clearing would occur in the highest-quality habitat, which includes old, mature trees.

EPA chair Darren Walsh said the authority would provide a summary of the submissions to Alcoa for response before completing its assessment of the two proposals in the first half of next year. The authority would then present its report and recommendations to the state’s environment minister.

An Alcoa spokesperson said the company believed environmental factors should be “purposefully considered and responsibly managed in conjunction with development activities necessary to produce the aluminium required to meet growing global demand, largely driven by requirements for decarbonisation”.

“In both our current mining areas, and in future mining areas before the WA EPA – a proposal which involves clearing less than a 1 per cent additional area of the Northern Jarrah Forest over the next 20 years – we have avoidance measures in place to protect areas of high conservation value,” they said.

“Our environmental review documentation outlines the mitigation measures that Alcoa considers will ensure there are no significant impacts to threatened species including black cockatoos.”

A spokesperson said proposed mitigation measures include avoiding known or potential black cockatoo nesting trees and maintaining buffer zones around them.

Henryon said Baudin’s were so familiar to Western Australians, “we almost take them for granted”.

“We have these birds flying around; they are part of the south-west’s identity. Are we happy for them to just fade away?” he said.

“If we want to protect them, we need to look after their homes. If we’re fair dinkum about this, we actually have to do something.”

 

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