Hi Michael, Hi Jason
Well, stock dove is mainly using rabbit holes for nesting in the area of Bonn, in gravel pits.
And wouldn ´t the Green and Great spotted woodpeckers holes be too small for Stock Dove or Tawny Owl? (Tawny city population also not in decline until now)
In the woods here stock doves use black woodpecker holes that are larger.
Whereas many holes the ringnecks use, seem to be about the size of green woodpecker holes or of great spotted woodpecker. The preferred hole size seems to be something one bird can just squeeze in.
It was feared the parrots could drive woodpeckers out of their nesting holes again and again, so they have to build and build and have no chance to start breeding.
this sounds somewhat exaggerated to me, as the parakeets seem to start earlier with breeding than the peckers, and the peckers can be quite aggressive.
A Monk parakeet nest is something quite faszinating. It is a communal nest and every monk parakeet pair has its own nesting hole, just like in some weavers.
They like to nest on Date palms in spain (Especially Canary Date palm; but I also saw nests in other trees like Eucalyptus), and also the nests can become quite big, they are often not well to see, especially if there are still some older , brown leafs in the the crown.
Concerning Black Grouse and Pheasant-similar results in germany, but disease was also involved. Pheasants are much less sensitive to some infections than the tetraonids.
recently I read that a similar thing was also going on in the red squirrel-grey squirrel situation-greys are insensitive to a disease caused by parapox virus, but often carry it; whereas this causes about 20% mortality in the red squirrels...
Back to parakeets- Red Squirrel predation on eggs and young also seems to be not uncommon; ringnecks then flock , giving alarm calls and try to chase the squirrel off-only partly successfull.
Are interactions similar with grey squirrels?