Occupation of lighting towers by Monk parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus) in La Plata city Argentina

ARAMBURÚ, ROSANA M; ARIAS RIOS, JORGE; CREGO, AGUSTINA; BERKUNSKY, IGOR

Puerto Iguazú

Congreso; Ornithological Congress of the Americas; 2017

Association of Field Ornithologists, Aves Argentinas, and Sociedade Brasileira de Ornitologia

In the city of La Plata we studied lighting towers used as nest platform of the Monk Parakeets (Myiopsitta monachus), in order to record the number of chambers and estimate a rate of construction. We found nests in four types of lighting towers and to check their present and past photographic records, we used Street View. There weredetected a total of 13 lighting columns with 18 nests (1.4 nests /column with nest, D.S=0.5). Each nest had between one and five chambers (1.6 chambers /nest, D.S. = 1). All nests were active. In those columns we calculated a construction rate of 12 nests / year. The occupation rate was 22% and our projection indicates that all the columns would be occupied with nests in 2018. We advise to make structural modifications to avoid the advance in the use of these particular columns.