
%0 Journal Article
%A Brooker, Lesley 
%A Brooker, Michael 
%T Local distribution, metapopulation viability and conservation of the Blue-breasted Fairy-wren in fragmented habitat in the Western Australian wheatbelt
%J Emu
%D 2003/10/10
%V 103
%N 3
%P 185-198
%K 
%R https://doi.org/10.1071/MU02045
%U https://www.publish.csiro.au/paper/MU02045 
%X The distribution of Blue-breasted Fairy-wrens, Malurus pulcherrimus, in 12 million hectares of the central wheatbelt of Western Australia was determined from &#39;presence/absence&#39; records obtained from a search of 273 10&#8242; blocks of latitude and longitude, supplemented with &#39;presence-only&#39; records from the Birds Australia Atlas II, the literature and unpublished records. A simple &#39;rule of thumb&#39; method is presented for ranking remnant neighbourhoods on their metapopulation potential, as a means of assessing future population persistence with respect to the size and isolation of vegetation remnants. The method is used to model the metapopulation structure of Blue-breasted Fairy-wrens and to map their relative likelihood of occurrence across the fragmented landscape of the central wheatbelt. The conservation implications are discussed. 
