Here come the lorikeets! How garden trends can change the local wildlife

Close-up of rainbow lorikeet perching on branch in Canberra. Long term data collected by the Canberra Ornithology Group shows their numbers skyrocketing. Photograph: Mohammad Norouzi/500px/Getty Images

My bird-watching friend Simon is telling me about the parrots he sees on his daily walks around Canberra. It is a long list, which includes five types of cockatoos. When he gets to the tenth parrot species – “red-rumps. Everyone loves those” – he stops to think. The eleventh is the rainbow lorikeet.

“They’re newcomers,” he says. “And they’ve really taken off.”