The last week on birding-aus has got me thoroughly depressed about the state of the environment and the value placed on it by politicians and other authorities in Australia, especially at state level.
We’ve had more news about duck hunting in Victoria, news about possible logging in national parks in NSW to add to the folly of amateur hunting in the nat parks, the possibility of logging on Bruny Island in Tassie, and the horrific details of the Qld govt’s plans, and burn-off cockups in SA wiping out habitat of vulnerable and endangered birds.
Is there any good news from WA or NT coz it’s not coming from elsewhere???
I will of course write to MPs, sign petitions, etc, but what is so profoundly depressing is that so little of the population at large and apparently even fewer politicians actually care.
Sigh.
Ian
It is indeed a sad world – the trouble is we in Birding-Aus and other such associations all care, but how to persuade others I don’t know. As Sonja says, there are others who do care. Wildlife Victoria consists of an amazing group of people, and has certainly had my support for some time.
No good news from up here as you’ll know if you saw my email on Gamba Grass. Also indigenous rangers are resigning for reasons to do with bad management through the public service. They (the rangers) tell me that now weeds are overtaking the parks they once looked after.
Denise
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Yes, here’s a bit more bad news which you may not have heard about. The Saltfield wetlands at Dry Creek north of Adelaide are to close in June and be redeveloped for housing. And to make things worse, The Saltfields at Price are also closed to birders following some silly behaviour by a birder. This followed Cheetham Salt imposing near impossible clothing requirements which made it difficult enough to comply anyway.
They want us out, full stop.
Tony
Hi Ian,
I felt like that too all yesterday.
In the evening however, I was processing some photos I’d taken the previous week for a talk at a parkland which has been developed from an old quarrying site I think. When I was processing one of a female Hardhead, I noticed that there was fishing line probably coming from her bill as there was line and then a metal sinker just showing above the water level on her breast. That depressed me further, but I decided to post it on a forum I belong to, to find out if there was anyone I could contact to try to help the duck.
Someone from Queensland responded really quickly and told me to try Wildlife Rescue Victoria. I decided to check them out on the internet that evening before I rang first thing in the morning. They are a volunteer group with no government funding, but seem to be very organised as I was able to fill in a form on line about the duck and send it off. I received an automatically generated response which was very encouraging.
This morning before I could ring, I had a call from them to see if I was able to go over to see if the duck was still there. I told the lady it was half an hour away, so she said she would try to send someone anyway. A little later I received a call from a rescuer to check which side of a creek I had meant as she was about to leave to look for the duck. The weather in Melbourne was cold, wet and windy at the time, so even if politicians don’t care, there are a lot of people out there who do care, and some who even do something about it.
I hope it makes you feel a little cheered, as it has me.
Sonja
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