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Hungry mutton birds drop from the sky on long trek from Siberia

Population surge responsible for muttonbird deaths

A number of dead birds were found on Fisherman's Beach at Torquay.

ABC News: Margaret Paul

The Department of Environment and Primary Industry (DEPI) says a population surge is behind the large number of dead birds washing up on Victorian beaches.

Thousands of dead shearwaters, or mutton birds, have washed up on beaches between Gabo Island and Portland on their annual migration from Siberia.

Wildlife officer Stan Williams says it is the largest number of dead birds since 2009.

"It's more to do with the fact that they're the most numerous bird in Australia - there's millions of them, when they arrive," he said.

"They outgrow their food source and they have a big die-back when that occurs and then we have all these birds wash-ups."

He said DEPI records a small number of deaths each year.

"On previous years we've had autopsies done on some of them and they've all had starvation as the cause of death," he said.

Mr Williams says the birds fly thousands of kilometres.

"Because they're flying from the other side of the world, they lose condition anyway because of the energy expended," he said.

"They drop down now and again to feed as a group and if the food source isn't there they don't get as much and they arrive here in an exhausted condition and it doesn't take much to tip them over from there."

He said shearwaters breed quickly so the deaths will not have a big impact on the overall population number.

In most cases, the birds' bodies will be eaten by predator animals or washed back out to sea to decompose.

But in some cases the committee responsible for the beach will remove them.

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