Phil Digney with a forest red-tailed black cockatoo. Picture: Matthew PoonA LOVE of birds, begun in childhood, has become a career for the new head of the Kaarakin Black Cockatoo Conservation Centre.

“I have clear memories of standing on the school oval and watching flocks of thousands of black cockatoos flying over – their noise, their presence, the colours on the tail,” Kalamunda resident Phil Digney said.

“I also knew my neighbour used to shoot them. I think that kind of experience shakes you subconsciously.”

Mr Digney spent his youth breeding and rearing birds, left school to work in Broome, Kalbarri and Adelaide zoos, and moved on to field work in the Seychelles and New Zealand, before returning full circle to the endangered black cockatoo.

Since starting as Kaarakin’s general manager late last year he has changed its name from Rehabilitation to Conservation Centre.

“We want to change the perception that we just put bandaids on birds. It’s more than a rehab centre,” he said.

“Our philosophy is every bird is important, and as bird populations decline, numbers become more and more important … but we also want to push our revegetation program.

“We are as much about conserving habitats as species.”

Mr Digney has used his first months to strengthen partnerships with Perth Zoo, the Department of Environment and Conservation and Perth universities, to raise the centre’s profile and support its breed-for-release program.

“You can’t just let a bird go into the wild,” he said. “You have to develop its predator recognition, wild food recognition and social behaviour over about 18 months.

“As the population declines, we will need this program to supplement wild flocks.”

Funding remains a problem.

“We are always rattling the can,” said Mr Digney, whose 2013 goal is to open the centre to the public, with educational tours and walk trails.

“One day, people will be able to come to our natural bush setting for an up-close and personal experience with our endangered cockatoos,” he said.