Endangered
Black-eared miner
Manorina melanotis
The black-eared miner is an endangered honeyeater endemic to mallee woodland in south-eastern Australia.
The perching bird
Black-eared miner is a perching bird in the family Meliphagidae (order Passeriformes) — Manorina melanotis.
Range and habitat
The black-eared miner is an endangered honeyeater endemic to mallee woodland in south-eastern Australia.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Breeding
Black-eared miners are co-operative breeders, living in colonies during the breeding season, and dispersing into the bush during non-breeding periods. In 2022, it was reported that the species had been interbreeding with the yellow-throated miner.
In crisis
Black-eared miners' survival became threatened by habitat clearance to make way for agriculture, and the bird experienced competition from feral goats, European rabbits, kangaroos, and other large herbivores, that then had access to water that they had not previously had. The species was assessed as "probably Australia's rarest and most endangered bird" in 2016 by ornithologist John McLaughlin, while a 2018 study ranked it as the 10th bird at most risk of extinction. As of 2022, there remain around 200 colonies, with up to 20 birds within each colony.
Interbreeding with the yellow-throated miner has affected the genetic integrity of the black-eared miner, that adds to the risk to their population. The species is listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List (2021.3) and under the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999, and its conservation status in several Australian states is as follows: New South Wales: Listed as "Critically Endangered" by the Biodiversity Conservation Act 2016 (NSW), as of February 2022.
Black-eared miner is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Black-eared miner, Wikidata item Q664401. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
