Fürth, Germany — Animal welfare activists disrupted the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of adidas in Fürth, Germany, today with shareholders calling on corporate executives, CEO Björn Gulden and CFO Harm Ohlmeyer, to answer why the company persists in sourcing kangaroo skins even though the commercial killing of the marsupials plainly violates adidas policies on humane treatment of animals.
Well, it’s got to be the platypus. Everything about the platypus is utterly ridiculous. The fact that this animal even exists is is a defiant middle finger to everything we traditionally thought about how mammals work. It’s no secret that it looks weird, but I doubt many know just how weird it truly is, so let’s take a deep dive into the platypus world.
Wildlife advocacy initiative Defend the Wild has called on the Andrews Government to halt the killing of Victoria’s threatened dingoes after harrowing footage of dingoes being trapped and shot obtained by the group was revealed on the ABC’s 7.30 Report la
Dr John Kingston, Veterinary Advisor to Australia's National Dingo Preservation and Recovery Program, says that the internationally beloved dingoes of Fraser Island (K'Gari) have all but disappeared from their beach territories as government authorities condemn survivors to a cruel death by starvation.
Dr Kingston said he was appalled at the condition of dingoes observed during recent NDPRP visits to the island.
‘Dingoes said by government and animal welfare authorities to be naturally lean are revealed as starving and probably doomed to extinction in photographs taken on the island for the NDPRP’, Dr Kingston said. ‘Hip bones protruding, backbone, ribs, muscle wastage, are all evidence that there is not enough food for these animals.
‘The Fraser Island dingoes are a semi-domesticate, an apex predator unique in the world, in that they form a bridge between the wild and humanity. Upwards of 80% of visitors to Fraser Island-K’gari wish to see a dingo in the wild. Is it any wonder, with seeing dingoes in this emaciated state that people want to feed them?
‘I don’t believe there is any veracity in the argument that feeding dingoes makes them aggressive. There is no scientific evidence for this at all. And yet it is an argument consistently raised and repeated by government authorities and their scientific advisors. This false belief was shown to be based on misinterpreted data in a paper by Rob Appleby, Bradley Smith et al, and another by Arian Wallach and Adam O’Neill. Prior to 1994 when the feeding of dingoes was stopped on Fraser Island, there had never been an attack by a dingo on a human.‘Therefore,’ Dr Kingston says, ‘it is imperative that feeding of these dingoes commences. There is also no data to prove government statements that the dingoes will overpopulate the Island if supplementarily fed, as dingoes self-regulate their own numbers. These imaginary problems never occurred during the thousands of years the dingoes were fed. We call for random food drops immediately.’
The Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service, which has legal responsibility for the animals’ welfare has consistently rejected conservationist concerns.
And the RSPCA, which once warned that the QPWS could be prosecuted for animal cruelty over its use of dingo traps on the island, now seems to back management policies, also referring to ‘skinny dingoes’ which it says are naturally lean and in good condition.
‘The photos show young females from the same territory, not old enough to reproduce and obviously not subject to pack support or discipline, now being pregnant, a sign of a species in crisis’, he said.
‘In a stable dingo pack, alpha females suppress breeding amongst other female pack members, so they are more able to help care for her pups and raise a successful litter.
‘Where are the animal ethics, and can we as a nation of animal lovers continue to watch as these animals slowly die a cruel death from starvation?
‘Do we wish for our overseas visitors to see the way we treat these precious iconic animals?
‘Where is Compassionate Conservation in all this?’
Dr John Kingston, BVSc,
Veterinary advisor
National Dingo Preservation and Recovery Program (Inc. A0051763G )(NDPRP)
You are cordially invited to attend the forthcoming AGM of PPCC Inc. Our guest speaker Tania Ireton from Birdlife Australia is sure to be of great interest to all, so please feel free to invite other colleagues and to circulate this invitation widely. Ms. Tania Ireton BirdLife Australia Tania’s talk “A Brief Spotlight on Australia’s Birds” will cover topics including Avian biology and evolution of birdsong, endangered birds, and the relationship between the black cockatoo and banksia integrifolia (Coastal Banksia). Tania is President of BirdLife Bayside and holds a Graduate Certificate in Ornithology. She has travelled all over Australia and its territories and to New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Sumatra, Hong Kong, South Korea and New Caledonia in search of birds. Tania is one of less than 20 people who has compiled an observer’s list of over 800 Australian bird species. Tania is also a member of the Victorian Ornithological Records Appraisal Committee which assesses and adjudicates on submitted claims of rare birds in Victoria. Your questions will be welcome.
PORT PHILLIP CONSERVATION COUNCIL INC.
Annual General Meeting
Monday 22nd October 2018
At
LONGBEACH PLACE*
15 CHELSEA ROAD, CHELSEA AT 7 PM.
Melways 97 B1, or see Google Maps link at Longbeach Place
GUEST SPEAKER Ms. Tania Ireton BirdLife Australia Tania’s talk “A Brief Spotlight on Australia’s Birds” will cover topics including Avian biology and evolution of birdsong, endangered birds, and the relationship between the black cockatoo and banksia integrifolia (Coastal Banksia). Tania is President of BirdLife Bayside and holds a Graduate Certificate in Ornithology. She has travelled all over Australia and its territories and to New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Sumatra, Hong Kong, South Korea and New Caledonia in search of birds. Tania is one of less than 20 people who has compiled an observer’s list of over 800 Australian bird species. Tania is also a member of the Victorian Ornithological Records Appraisal Committee which assesses and adjudicates on submitted claims of rare birds in Victoria. Your questions will be welcome.
*Longbeach Place, our usual venue, is a community centre walking distance from Chelsea station near the intersection of Chelsea Rd and Nepean Highway. Proceed down Chelsea Rd from Nepean Highway and Longbeach Place is on your left directly behind Chelsea Library. There is a car park between the library and Longbeach Place. Entrance door faces the car park. See Google Maps Longbeach Place
Please feel free to contact me with any queries.
We look forward to seeing you at the meeting.
Jenny Warfe
Secretary
PPCC Inc.
0405 825769
www.ppcc.org.au
The National Dingo Preservation and Recover Program (NDPRP) today congratulated the Victorian government for recent progressive policy initiatives regarding dingo conservation in that state. This has included recognition of aspirations for protection of the dingo by Indigenous Victorians. Policy references to protecting apex predator function within Victorian ecosystems, including in north western Victoria, are welcome and long overdue. The NDPRP, however, called upon the Victorian government to follow through in practice and to cease being captive to the environmentally draconian ideas still propagated by reactionary elements within the farming lobby.
NDRPR spokesperson, Arthur Gorrie, stated:
”There are now many environmentally progressive elements within the farming sector. However, the 19th Century ‘man against nature’ view of apex predators is still prevalent amongst Victorian farmers. Unfortunately, the Victorian government continues to cave in to the environmental ignorance of the Victorian farming lobby. Major features of anti-dingo propaganda from the farming lobby include reference to dingoes as ‘wild dogs’, and the gross exaggeration of the scale of farm stock loss to dingoes.”
The NDPRP considers that the scale and economic significance of harm to farm live stock from dingo/’wild dog’ predation in Victoria has been consistently and irresponsibly exaggerated.
Mr Gorrie stated:
“In 2016-17, officially recorded stock loss from predation for the whole of Victoria was 995. At this time, Australian Bureau of Statistics agricultural data show the Victorian sheep/lamb population to have been over 13 million. This translates to a predation rate of 76 sheep/lambs per one million sheep in Victoria. Yet, the Victorian government continues to waste millions of Victorian tax payer dollars every year placating extremist and environmentally destructive demands from the farm lobby. This is at the expense of the natural environment.”
When the geographically uneven nature of predation is taken into account, the stock loss rates are still relatively low. For the Victorian regions of Gippsland and Hume in eastern Victoria, where predations rates are higher than the Victorian average, 1 sheep in every 1,000 is lost to predation. These farming areas are situated close to important dingo habitat and biodiversity regions.”
Mr Gorrie added:
”Not only have claims about the scale of farm stock predation been consistently exaggerated, but convincing empirical evidence to show the effectiveness of lethal control in protecting farm stock has been lacking. High impact lethal control methods have continued to be introduced, for political reasons, without scientific justification, including aerial baiting and a wild dog bounty for recreational hunters.”
He further stated that:
”Not only is recreational shooting widely accepted as an ineffective means of pest animal control, but recreational hunters are effectively permitted to hunt dingoes over wide areas of public land and can claim the bounty with no guarantee that the wild dogs taken are from locations where farm stock predation has occurred. No accurate data about kill location is required from recreational hunters when claiming the bounty.”
”At the same time, the Victorian government reintroduced aerial baiting without reliable evidence that it is effective in protecting farm stock. This has occurred without due consideration for wider environmental damage, and without adequate consideration to the very low actual stock predation rates in Victoria. Politics have taken precedence over responsible environmental management.
”
The Victorian government, having now publically recognised the environmental significance of apex predators, including the dingo, must be consistent in other policy areas. The Victorian government cannot be considered serious in its stewardship of the natural environment while it continues to adhere to environmentally damaging farm sector hyperbole against the most significant apex predator in Victorian ecosystems – the dingo.
I found what struck me personally as egregious growthist propaganda dressed up as an academic research article on The Conversation, yesterday: "Blaming immigrants for unemployment, lower wages and high house prices is too simplistic." [February 23, 2018 11.26am AEDT]. The article was headed up by professor of economics, Robert Breunig from the Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, and co-authored by Mark Fabian, Postgraduate student, Australian National University. Professor Breunig disclosed that he receives funding from the Productivity Commission, which I think is a leopard with continuously changing arrangement of spots according to whatever political background it needs to blend into for survival. Leith van Onselen's debate with Migration Council's CEO Carla Wilshire of the on the ABC’s National Wrapdocumented here, seems to illustrate this, but for all I know the professor and his student actually believe what they write.
Criticising ex-PM Tony Abbott's extremely belated calls for reducing Australia's immigration-fed overpopulation problems, Breunig and Fabian write, “But migrants also bring capital, investing in houses, appliances, businesses, education and many other things. This increases economic activity and the number of jobs available.” It sounds like they are describing molecules in a heated gas.
Increasing economic activity increases impact on our environment and politically disempowers us. Massive population growth in this country is removing our choices of what we can buy with money, whilst inflating the cost of the reduced amenity and shelter that population growth is causing. That's impoverishing. Just on the business side, the cost of premises and paying wages so that employees can afford housing makes Australian businesses globally uncompetitive and provides an explanation for their mysteriously high rate of failure.
I am going to talk about how changes to laws and standards as to how our natural environment and urban spaces are treated and our rights within them are taking place without any meaningful public discussion or empowerment in order to allow growth to proceed.
Breunig and Fabian's article completely ignores the beautiful non-human environment we have in Australia, the green bits of which are being cut up into biogeographical islands, then paved over, subdivided and sold for ever higher monetary value. I suspect this failure to engage with nature is because its writers currently live in a bubble and simply don’t know or care about wildlife or green spaces or have compartmentalised this reality. So they are writing without my values or those of many other Australians or the values that attracted many immigrants.
Although there are laws for the protection of wildlife in this country, they are simply not applied. This is one reason that population growth can continue, for the recently beefed up Prevention of Cruelty Act 1986, the Fauna and Flora Guarantee Act 1988 and the Catchment and Land Protection Act 1994 would otherwise prevent the big business and government agenda for a big human population and infrastructure expansion.
I am, however, acutely aware, because I am involved personally, of how various authorities and contractors are expecting local wildlife carers and rescuers to clean up the huge callous mess and damage to flesh and blood that they are causing. Carers and rescuers are paying for artifical nests, feeding, nursing and medicating so many injured and displaced animals. Then those carers have to find some other place to release them, as habitat is destroyed all around them, whilst people like the authors of this article I am commenting on are claiming that the only problem about housing is failure to release land. We on this side of reality are fighting to stop the ‘release’ of land to bitumen and profit for a few in the growth lobby. (I am also qualified to talk about the growth lobby because I was the first person to write about it in Australia in a 2002 thesis - The Growth lobby in Australia and its Absence in France - which compared our system to the French one, which latter costs population growth as a cost to the public purse.)
Here are some examples of the callous vandalism that is taking place as we speak:
I live in Victoria and currently VicRoads and Melbourne Water are removing an extraordinary number of trees. For the expansion of the Melbourne metro rail project (which aims to cater for our artificially stimulated population growth) I have been informed that around 800 trees are being removed from urban Melbourne. Most of these are large mature trees, which have provided shade and enjoyment to people, and habitat for Australian wildlife, including birds and mammals. The public has not been consulted in any meaningful way about this. The St Kilda Road Avenue that leads to the war memorial and the botanic gardens, has been vandalised for this purpose. This avenue is a feature of Melbourne not unlike the Champs Elysees of Paris. To vandalise this is equivalent to a resounding slap across the face by Melbourne Planners of citizens who grew up here. Many find it shocking and distressing as a recent protest shows. /node/5413
But it is not just rail changes that are destroying wildlife habitat. Melbourne Roads have recently changed their policy on roadside and median strip vegetation, with absolutely devastating results for local climate, ammenity and habitat: /node/5304
Then Melbourne water is now treating small local retardant basins as major dams, under the ANCOLD guidelines. Why are small retarding basins being treated as major dams? Because our 60% immigration fueled population growth has caused urban densification and the proliferation of hard surfaces. Although this was predicted by residents with foresight in many VCAT battles, these hard surfaces now carry the threat of major floods, so the small retarding basins that were adequate for many decades, now are deemed in need of reinforcement to bring them up to major dam status!
What has this got to do with trees and wildlife habitat and human amenity, you ask?
These new ANCOLD guidelines require the removal of all trees from ‘batters’ or dam banks. Since previous thinking caused the planting of trees because trees stabilise earth-forms, this ‘new’ thinking requires the removal of another huge quantity of mature trees, denuding much parkland throughout Victoria. Can you blame me if I suspect this is also to suit private developers and people who want land ‘released’ [from the commons and nature]?
The implications of these ANCOLD guidelines (which are now an Australian standard that is threatening green spaces all over the green bits surrounding this 70% hot desert and rangeland island) are staggering for the green wedges that follow Victoria’s rivers and creeks, their canopies cooling our environment through transpirational heat exchange, lowering water tables through the same transpiration, providing habitat for our wildlife and a green commons for our human spirits. Melbourne Water is in charge of more than 200 such basins. It pretends to follow guidelines to protect the displaced wildlife but in fact it does not have plans in place for their survival and reestablishment. It invites people to ‘revegetate’ what it has devastated, but our wildlife cannot wait for 25 yrs while trees grow to maturity, or 100 yrs plus until natural hollows occur. And the cheek of Melbourne Water to invite the people for whom its works have diminished their natural ammenity to replant such areas and not be paid! Insults added to injury. If you want to read more about this scandal, and its impact on wildlife, community and democracy, have a look at /node/5401 and https://awpc.org.au/awpc-to-melbourne-water-response-on-tree-removal-lee-st-retardant-basin/. Furthermore, there is a rumour that the Federal government is planning to make work like tree-planting mandatory for environmental organisations to qualify as tax-deductible. Slave labour for public works damage! And when every government leads with the plaintive cry of "Jobs!" This is where the labour is required.
And it doesn’t stop there. Big money in densifying rural areas is impeding the passage of kangaroos to their feeding grounds, with the usual myth [See https://awpc.org.au/roo-scientists-admit-industry-stimulates-roo-population-growth-whilst-calling-roos-pests/ ] that there are ‘too many’ - a hollow farce familiar to the wildlife carers who must deal with the injuries that come from ‘gentlemen farmers’ taking potshots with permission from the ever generous and poorly overseen permissions to cull issued by DWELP: https://awpc.org.au/awpc-speak-out-against-the-culling-of-kangaroos-in-cape-schanck/.
And then there are there is the devastation caused by freeways and tollways created to ‘solve’ the congestion problems created by overpopulation. Money given to Parks Victoria by Peninsula Link for predator proof fences around scarce bandicoot habitat has been diverted to another program far from the original area, consolidating the damage that wildlife campaigners thought they might have mitigated in this place.
Of course the public think that Parks Victoria is looking after animals in the parks it manages for ‘healthy people’, but we cannot rely on Parks Victoria. See /node/2376 and /node/2377.
And the examples I give here are actually taking place at the mouth of the Mornington Peninsula Biosphere - scheduled for densification, of course. Shame!
It is not the big-name conservation organisations but the hands on volunteers in organisations like AWPC (whose articles I have used as examples) that are doing the hard yards in this vicious losing battle against a delusional ideology fueled by speculative money that wants to increase human population despite our population being bigger by an order of magnitude than it has ever been for the bulk of its history. Does economics totally lack a sense of proportion or irony? The King Midas myth and the magic pudding pale against the science of modern economics which seems so similar to 17th century economics and official religion.
The notions put forward in the article I am commenting on simply stagger me in their unreal, coldly irrational model of the world we live in, biological human values, and what passes in The Conversation for research and analysis. Unfortunately these are the dominant models and values that are then acted on by governments and their contractors, in a great tragedy for this beautiful and fragile land that gives us all life.
Researchers from Museums Victoria and the University of Melbourne have CT scanned all 13 known Tasmanian tiger joey specimens to create 3D digital models which have allowed them to study their skeletons and internal organs, and reconstruct their growth and development. This has revealed important new information about how this unique extinct marsupial evolved to look so similar to the dingo, despite being very distantly related.
The digital scans show that when first born the Tasmanian tiger or thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) looked like any other marsupial.
But three months later, when they left the pouch they had taken on the appearance of a puppy and continued to grow with a dog-like appearance.
The research, led by the University of Melbourne and Museums Victoria and in conjunction with an international team of scientists, is published today [Wednesday 21 February, 11:30AM AEST] in Royal Society Open Science.
It comes from the same team who successfully sequenced the thylacine genome in December 2017.
The Tasmanian tiger was a marsupial, which raised its young in a pouch.
Its resemblance to the dingo is one of the best examples of “convergent evolution” in mammals. This is where, two species, despite not being closely related, evolve to look very similar.
The Tasmanian tiger would have last shared a common ancestor with the canids (dogs and wolves) around 160 million years ago.
Dr Christy Hipsley, Research Associate at Museums Victoria and the University of Melbourne said after sequencing the Tasmanian tiger genome in 2017, this research fills one more piece of the puzzle on why they have evolved to look so similar to dogs.
“This is the first digital development series of the Tasmanian tiger, Australia’s most iconic extinct marsupial predator. Using CT technology we have been able to garner new information on the biology of this iconic species, and its growth and development.”
“These scans show in incredible detail how the Tasmanian tiger started its journey in life as a joey that looked very much like any other marsupial, with robust forearms so that it could climb into its mother's pouch. But by the time it left the pouch around 12 weeks to start independent life, it looked more like a dog or wolf, with longer hind limbs than forelimbs.”
Once ranging throughout Australia and New Guinea, the Tasmanian tiger disappeared from the mainland around 3,000 years ago, likely due to competition with humans and dingos.
The remaining Tasmanian tiger population, isolated on Tasmania, was hunted to extinction in the early 20th century, with the last known individual dying at Hobart Zoo in 1936.
Axel Newton, PhD student and Lead Author on the paper notes, “Until now, there have only been limited details on its growth and development. For the very first time, we have been able to look inside these remarkably rare and precious specimens.”
Unable to study the living species, the team had to look to the 13 Tasmanian tiger joey specimens that exist in museum collections worldwide, including three from the collection of Museums Victoria.
These joey specimens, representing five stages of postnatal development, were scanned using non-invasive X-ray micro-CT scanning technology to create high-resolution 3D digital models, in which all their internal structures such as skeleton and organs could be studied.
Associate Professor Andrew Pask from the University of Melbourne and Museums Victoria explains this was an incredibly effective technique to study the skeletal anatomy of the specimens without causing any damage to them.
“This research clearly demonstrates the power of CT technology. It has allowed us to scan all the known Thylacine joey specimens in the world, and study their internal structures in high resolution without having to dissect or cause damage to the specimen.”
“By examining their bone development, we’ve been able to illustrate how the Tasmanian tiger matured and identify when they took on the appearance of a dog.”
The study has also revealed the incorrect classification of two specimens held in the collection of the Tasmanian Museums and Art Gallery (TMAG). Instead, they are most likely to be quolls or Tasmanian devils, based on the number of vertebrate and presence of large epipubic bones (specialised bones that support the pouch in modern marsupials).
Senior Curator of Vertebrate Zoology at TMAG, Ms Kathryn Medlock said that the museum had received many requests to dissect its pouch young over the years but requests were always refused.
“One of the major advantages of this new technology is that it has enabled us to do research and answer many questions without destruction of the sample specimens. This is a significant advancement that also has an additional benefit of helping us to learn more about the identity of these specimens that have been in the TMAG collection for many years.”
An exciting outcome of the research is that the 3D digital Tasmanian tiger models are to be made publicly available as a resource for current and future researchers.
AWPC writes that only two of its questions were answered satisfactorily. It asks Melbourne Water what happens to the wildlife after the clearing? “The AWPC, wildlife rescuers and shelters regularly experience the fallout of such projects. Consultants and wildlife handlers are contracted at a premium price, only to hand over displaced, orphaned and injured wildlife to either vets or local wildlife shelters who are then expected to deal with these sentinel beings at their own cost. Quite frankly this is unacceptable and needs to stop, which is why the AWPC ask you the following questions once again.” Inside, full correspondence to date.
Craig Thomson
President, Australian Wildlife Protection Council
502 Waterfall Gully Road, Rosebud 3939
[email protected]
0474 651 292
Mark Lawrence
Melbourne Water Project Manager
990 La Trobe Street Docklands VIC 3008
PO Box 4342 Melbourne VIC 3001
[email protected]
Dear Mr. Lawrence,
Re: your response to my email sent 23/1/2018 about the ‘Lee St Retarding Basin Upgrades’
Overall, it was a very disappointing response, especially as most of your answers are already available on your community information sheet. Only two questions were answered satisfactorily; were you confirmed that you have forwarded my query about the sale of Melbourne Water land to the relevant department and the dates of the pre-fauna survey. We have spent a great deal of time putting these questions to you because of the lack of information provided by Melbourne Water to concerned members of the community.
Is Melbourne Water concerned about genuine community consultation and being transparent to the community to whom they provide an essential service? The Australian Wildlife Protection Council (AWPC) will be putting in a Freedom of Information request for the documents you have not supplied, including the ecological/fauna reports, however we will also complain to the concerned ministers, local councilors and community members about Melbourne Water’s lack of openness and communication. We believe you are scaring the community to justify these works whilst refusing to be transparent about the true risks. This is highlighted in your reply, by the following text, coupled with the fact that you are asking us to then submit an FOI for proof of this.
“Failure of the embankment would have a significant impact on a number of properties in the area.”
As you have identified, we are particularly concerned about the impacts on wildlife with the removal of vegetation; of the fifteen questions we sent to you eight are about wildlife. We ask Melbourne Water what happens to the wildlife after the clearing? The AWPC, wildlife rescuers and shelters regularly experience the fallout of these projects. Consultants and wildlife handlers are contracted at a premium price, only to hand over displaced, orphaned and injured wildlife to either vets or local wildlife shelters who are then expected to deal with these sentinel beings at their own cost. Quite frankly this is unacceptable and needs to stop, which is why the AWPC ask you the following questions once again:
1. Which wildlife rescue groups, wildlife shelters and vets have been contacted to look after or treat any injured wildlife?
2. Do local wildlife shelters have the capacity to look after injured wildlife during this busy time of the year?
3. What arrangements have been made to financially compensate these groups?
4. What measures have been taken to install nest boxes or other artificial habitat for displaced wildlife? (Please note that installation of nest boxes needs to be carefully planned in advance so as to enable wildlife to be bonded to new nests before re-release).
5. Do the contracted ‘wildlife handlers’ have appropriate wildlife handling experience as well as knowledge of the legislation about the re-location of wildlife.
6. Do the ‘wildlife handlers’ possess the appropriate permits to have protected wildlife relocated within a safe distance from their habitat loss or will animals be euthanased?
If Melbourne Water maintain, “Protection of wildlife is of great importance to Melbourne Water and we have committed to implement the handler’s recommendations” does Melbourne Water also commit to answering our questions for the ongoing protection of wildlife who will be effected by this project?
We can only assume, from your response, that the only community engagement so far planned by Melbourne Water, is to provide wood from the felled trees to various groups to make furniture. Yet, the community groups who will be most effected like environmental groups, wildlife rescuers, wildlife carers and shelters have not been included in this process what so at all!
To indicate that you are only going to plant 30 canopy trees within Frankston, in a place yet to be identified, does not seem to be fair compensation for the loss to the local environment. How did Melbourne Water come to this conclusion? Are these trees to be planted by community volunteers or are there to be separate plantings by contractors? The AWPC has identified a number of suitable sites close by, owned by Melbourne Water for these plantings.
We look forward to your reply and answers to our questions and we at the AWPC are happy to consult with Melbourne Water and/or your ecologist consultants to work on a better plan, communication and management for the future of this project.
Yours sincerely,
Craig Thomson
President, Australian Wildlife Protection Council
LETTER TO PRESIDENT CRAIG THOMSON FROM MARK LAWRENCED, MELBOURNE WATER PROJECT MANAGER
Mr Craig Thomson
President
Australian Wildlife Protection Council Inc.
[email protected]
Dear Mr Thomson
Thank you for your email enquiry regarding safety upgrade works at the Lee Street Retarding
Basin in Frankston.
We understand that you are concerned with the planned tree removal at the site and the
impact this may have on wildlife and their habitat.
Under Melbourne Water’s Statement of Obligations (2015) issued by the Minister for Water, we
are required to assess all existing retarding basins against the Australian National Committee
of Large Dams (ANCOLD) Guidelines. An assessment of the Lee Street Retarding Basin against
these guidelines identified that the site does not comply and safety upgrade works are required
to continue to reduce flood risk for the local community.
To ensure Lee Street Retarding Basin continues to operate safely and comply with the ANCOLD
guidelines, trees and vegetation on the length of the embankment will need to be removed as
part of the works. We have worked hard to ensure that we only remove trees that will affect
the integrity of the retarding basin and have committed to planting trees at other locations in
the Frankston City Council area.
The ANCOLD guidelines are publically available and a copy can be purchased online from
ANCOLD at their website: www.ancold.org.au The guidelines do not specifically mention trees
on retarding basin embankments. They provide guidance on how to assess risk on dams and
dam-like structures.
In the past, it was common practice to have trees on retarding basin embankments. However,
as international understanding of dam engineering has improved it has become evident that
trees significantly weaken embankments and increase the risk of failure in a high rainfall
event. Failure of the embankment would have a significant impact on a number of properties in
the area.
In 2015, Melbourne Water received independent specialist advice that trees on retarding basin
embankments increase the chance that the embankment may fail in the event of a large rain
event. The chance is increased due to:
“internal erosion and displacement of soil – tree roots create erosion pathways
through the embankment which are worsened when the tree dies and its
decaying roots leave voids through the embankment;
“trees uprooting and taking part of the embankment with them; and
“water speeding up around tree trunks and causing faster erosion.
As part of the works, the embankment must also be hardened to operate safely and this can’t
be done without the trees being removed.
We understand the importance of trees to the local community and have committed to
mitigating the impact of removing the embankment trees by:
“planting 30 canopy trees elsewhere in the Frankston City Council area;
“using the cut-down logs to provide a woodland habitat for wildlife at Lee Street
Retarding Basin; and
“recycling the cut down logs to make furniture that will be donated to Frankston
City Council.
A reinstatement plan has been developed in adherence to Frankston City Council’s Local Law
22 permit requirements and we will implement it in the coming months. In addition to the
reinstatement plan, wood from the trees at the site will be utilised by a local community group
and the community will also have an opportunity to participate in a planting day in Frankston
in coming months.
As part of the planning for the project, Melbourne Water engaged specialists to complete a
flora and fauna assessment and arborist assessment as part of Council’s requirements under
Local Law 22.
In your email you asked us to provide you with the arborist report and water depth and flood
modelling records. We ask you to request these under the Freedom of Information Act 1982
(Vic) to make an FOI request, please visit our website and use the online FOI application:
www.melbournewater.com.au Our FOI Officer, Michael Keough, is available to assist with your
application if required. Michael can be contacted on 9679 6821 or at
[email protected]
In addition to the flora and fauna assessment we have engaged a wildlife handler who will
manage and implement the wildlife management practices prior to and during the tree removal
activity. Protection of wildlife is of great importance to Melbourne Water and we have
committed to implement the handler’s recommendations including:
“undertaking a pre-construction visual inspection and assessment at Lee Street retarding
basin. This was completed on 29 January 2018 and found no EPBC Act-listed threatened
ecological communities or FFG Act-listed threatened flora communities present within the
Lee St study site.
“marking trees that have possible habitat to ensure that they are removed appropriately.
“confirming the species as listed in the flora and fauna assessment
“remaining onsite during the tree removal works to check and safely move fauna prior to
tree removal.
The wildlife handler we have engaged is a qualified ecologist and zoologist with 25 years’
experience.
The EPA guidelines referred to are in relation to hours of work. Work for this project will be
carried out in line with EPA guidelines between 7am and 6pm Monday to Friday and 7am and
1pm on Saturdays.
Your email included concern at the sale of Melbourne Water land in the Frankston area and the
potential loss of biodiversity. We have passed this on to our Property Team who will respond to
you direct.
Once again, thank you for your email.
Yours sincerely,
Mark Lawrence
Melbourne Water Project Manager
ORIGINAL LETTER FROM CRAIG THOMSON TO MELBOURNE WATER ABOUT REMOVING TREES FROM LEE ST RETARDANT BASIN
Letter from Craig Thomson, President AWPC
Dated 23 January 2017.
Subject: Lee st Retarding Basin Frankston
Addressed to: [email protected] (Biodiversity Officer at Frankston Council), [email protected] (Minister for Police and Water) [email protected] (email address for Melbourne Water retardant basin upgrades).
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council understands and recognise the needs to protect our communities from potential danger. We are also aware that the removal of vegetation has an impact on wildlife species. In fact it is a guarantee that wildlife will be killed during works that clear vegetation. As such we expect that every possible measure is undertaken to see if in fact clearing is necessary and if so that appropriate actions are taken and that local wildlife shelters are not left too pick up the pieces of poor planning.
We have received concern from the local community members that the threat of flooding to the local community at the Lee St retarding basin has not deemed a risk in the past and believe the proposed clearance of vegetation is excessive and will have significant impact on fauna as well as other issues, particularly of erosion and dust as well. So the Australian Wildlife Protection Council would greatly appreciate if you could answer the following questions;
-What pre-fauna surveys have been carried out and when?
-What species have been identified on site?
-What are the actions have been put into place for fauna pre, during and post construction activities for fauna?
-Which wildlife rescue groups, wildlife shelters and vets have been contacted to look after or treat any injured wildlife?
-What arrangements have been made to financially compensate these groups?
-Do local wildlife shelters have the capacity to look after injured wildlife, as they could be attending to heat stress events or bushfire effected wildlife?
-What measures have been taken to install nest boxes or other artificial habitat for displaced wildlife?
-Do they have appropriate wildlife handling permits as well as permits to have protected wildlife euthanised if injured or unable to relocate wildlife in a safe distance from their habitat loss?
-What community groups have they contacted to work with as stated in their community information sheet? [Ref: ] “We understand the importance of trees to the local community and are committed to working closely with council, residents and community groups to develop an appropriate plan for reinstatement of trees else where in the area” in the information document provided for this project https://www.melbournewater.com.au/files/2018-01/Communitybulletin-LeeStreet.pdf
-Where are other trees being planted, what species are to be planted and how many?
-Are offsets being provided?
-Is there an arborist report of the trees health?
-Can records of water depth be provided for the Lee St retarding basin to show threat of flooding to neighbouring properties over the years of its existence?
-Can modelling or records be provided of local flooding for once in a 40+ year storm event?
-What are the EPA regulations you are keeping to with to for this project?
-Can you provide a copy of the ANCOLD guidelines?
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council also has the understanding that you are in the process of selling off land on McClelland Dve to Ambulance Victoria for an ambulance station and another permit application has been made by Log Cabin Caravan Park. In fact we believe that all land owned by Melbourne Water from Skye Rd to Frankston/Cranbourne Rd is being considered surplus land by Melbourne Water. So it appears there are several sites across the Frankston city council municipality owned by Melbourne Water that poses a potential loss of biodiversity.
So the final question we have to you is what is Melbourne Water’s commitment to biodiversity in Frankston?
Alan Hood is a Flood Researcher. Melbourne Water owns this Retarding Basin and their maintenance contractor, John Holland - KBR Joint Venture intend removing trees and various works in "late January" - any day now. This could be an attempt to cater for increased suburban stormwater runoff without increasing the capacity of the chain of retarding basins. Although prepared for dams which would normally be at least 10 to 15 m high, ANCOLD guidelines can also be used to assist with decisions on smaller dams, particularly where such dams create potential loss of life or significant damage. The attached Planning map shows Special Building Overlays (SBO) for Frankston; the identify areas likely to be flooded. If the Lee St Retarding Basin batters are at least 10 to 15 metres high, there might be some justification for removing the trees, but see more inside this article. [Introduction written by candobetter.net editor.]
Melbourne Water owns this Retarding Basin, and their maintenance contractor John Holland – KBR Joint Venture intend removing trees and various works in “late January” – any day now.
The trees around this Retarding Basin are a critical Koala corridor, and other native species live in and use them.
So, there is a conflict but the advice from John Holland and Melbourne Water appears to be too little, too late; the last community information session took place on January 22.
John Holland are using ANCOLD guidelines for removing these trees www.ancold.org.au
The Australian National Committee on Large Dams says: “ANCOLD guidelines are applicable for water or tailings dams with potential to cause loss of life or significant environmental or physical damage through operation or failure.
Although prepared for dams which would normally be at least 10 to 15 m high, ANCOLD guidelines can also be used to assist with decisions on smaller dams, particularly where a dam or series of dams creates potential loss of life or significant damage.
A Retarding Basin is not a permanent dam; it is one of the riskier methods of flood control, which seems to have become popular in Melbourne. In theory, when there is a heavy rainfall event, water rushes into the uphill end of the dam, and a small outlet at the lower end allows a much smaller amount of water to flow out. During this process the water level in the basin rises, and the hope is that the stormwater flow will stop before the basin overflows and send water cascading down the valley at full strength anyway.
If the Lee St Retarding Basin batters are at least 10 to 15 metres high, there might be some justification for removing the trees, however:
Unless John Holland – KBR Joint Venture has carried out engineering calculations for each of the retarding basins in the chain, and found deficiencies, and has addressed the points outlined above, they haven’t really addressed the safety issue or the wildlife issue.
Simply quoting the ANCOLD guidelines, which are for bigger, permanent, dams is not an excuse to avoid engineering calculations.
Attachment S4235
This Planning map shows Special Building Overlays (SBO) for Frankston; the identify areas likely to be flooded.
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council has written a letter to Melbourne Water, David Fairbridge, Frankston, and Lisa Neville, the Victorian Minister for the Environment, about a plans to remove mature trees from a wildlife corridor on the batters of a retardant basin in Frankston. They have received concern from the local community members that the threat of flooding to the local community at the Lee St retarding basin has not deemed a risk in the past and believe the proposed clearance of vegetation is excessive and will have significant impact on fauna as well as other issues, particularly of erosion and dust as well. They ask Melbourne Water a number of questoins and note that they expect that every possible measure will be undertaken to see if in fact clearing is necessary and if so that appropriate actions are taken and that local wildlife shelters are not left too pick up the pieces of poor planning.
Letter from Craig Thomson, President Australian Wildlife Protection Council, (AWPC)
Dated 23 January 2017.
Addressed to: [email protected] (biodiversity officer at Frankston Council), [email protected] (Minister for Police and Water) [email protected] (email address for Melbourne Water retardant basin upgrades).
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council understands and recognise the needs to protect our communities from potential danger. We are also aware that the removal of vegetation has an impact on wildlife species. In fact it is a guarantee that wildlife will be killed during works that clear vegetation. As such we expect that every possible measure is undertaken to see if in fact clearing is necessary and if so that appropriate actions are taken and that local wildlife shelters are not left too pick up the pieces of poor planning.
We have received concern from the local community members that the threat of flooding to the local community at the Lee St retarding basin has not deemed a risk in the past and believe the proposed clearance of vegetation is excessive and will have significant impact on fauna as well as other issues, particularly of erosion and dust as well. So the Australian Wildlife Protection Council would greatly appreciate if you could answer the following questions;
-What pre-fauna surveys have been carried out and when?
-What species have been identified on site?
-What are the actions have been put into place for fauna pre, during and post construction activities for fauna?
-Which wildlife rescue groups, wildlife shelters and vets have been contacted to look after or treat any injured wildlife?
-What arrangements have been made to financially compensate these groups?
-Do local wildlife shelters have the capacity to look after injured wildlife, as they could be attending to heat stress events or bushfire effected wildlife?
-What measures have been taken to install nest boxes or other artificial habitat for displaced wildlife?
-Do they have appropriate wildlife handling permits as well as permits to have protected wildlife euthanised if injured or unable to relocate wildlife in a safe distance from their habitat loss?
-What community groups have they contacted to work with as stated in their community information sheet? [Ref: ] “We understand the importance of trees to the local community and are committed to working closely with council, residents and community groups to develop an appropriate plan for reinstatement of trees else where in the area” in the information document provided for this project https://www.melbournewater.com.au/files/2018-01/Communitybulletin-LeeStreet.pdf
-Where are other trees being planted, what species are to be planted and how many?
-Are offsets being provided?
-Is there an arborist report of the trees health?
-Can records of water depth be provided for the Lee St retarding basin to show threat of flooding to neighbouring properties over the years of its existence?
-Can modelling or records be provided of local flooding for once in a 40+ year storm event?
-What are the EPA regulations you are keeping to with to for this project?
-Can you provide a copy of the ANCOLD guidelines?
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council also has the understanding that you are in the process of selling off land on McClelland Dve to Ambulance Victoria for an ambulance station and another permit application has been made by Log Cabin Caravan Park. In fact we believe that all land owned by Melbourne Water from Skye Rd to Frankston/Cranbourne Rd is being considered surplus land by Melbourne Water. So it appears there are several sites across the Frankston city council municipality owned by Melbourne Water that poses a potential loss of biodiversity.
So the final question we have to you is what is Melbourne Water’s commitment to biodiversity in Frankston?
Melbourne Water is about to de-tree Frankston koala corridor by removing mature trees from banks of a huge park with a water retarding basin in it at Lee Street Frankston 3199. They are claiming that the trees are 'destabilising' the banks. But of course the trees are holding the banks together and keeping the water-table down. Who is accountable for these kinds of decisions that are based on what sound like lies that make no sense? Frankston Council is apparently going along with this. It seems totally insane and anti-life and nature. Inside is a video alerting us to the details.
This is a link to a facebook video: https://www.facebook.com/Michellekoalasaver/videos/1831105523600205/.
The person speaking in the video is Michele Thomas, of Animalia, who is a well-respected wildlife carer, who knows what she is talking about regarding koalas. See "Animalia's Michelle Thomas gives koala mouth to mouth in night rescue".
This tree removal with barmy excuses seems to be a new trend. Recently they machine-ripped out trees all along the sides and median strips of a shady Mornington Peninsula highway, one of few relatively pleasant highways to travel on, due to the shade and green. See http://candobetter.net/node/5304. The reasons given were that cars might run into them and that they were for eliminating all risks. (Not risks of depression leading to suicide in those who were revolted and felt powerless, of course.) AWPC managed to stop them from ripping them out quite so fast, but the kept on with a different machine at a different pace and they paid for a few possum boxes (not enough for all the possums and other wildlife that were and continue to be displaced.)
We know that trees are being ripped out for more houses and more roads to squeeze in the
Knowing how the impacts of population growth have caused the de-treeing of Hoddle Street and St Kilda Road makes you wonder if the freeway de-treeing on the way to Dromana is really to allow more lanes to go in and if removal of trees from the retardant basin at Lee Street is really to permit houses or access routes there. It is like an engineering conspiracy against nature. And, of course, in the short term, there is money in it for the tree rippers and machine operators. What a sick sick society we have become in about 200 short years.
A koala was photographed today (25 November 2017) in the Frankston Reserve, just as Parks Victoria are about to rip down the fences and open the gates for 24 hour recreational access. This park had been until recently a natural reserve for wildlife, established with great difficulty by local wildlife activists and scientists. Urgent action is required to stop Parks Victoria from giving the public 24hr access to Frankston Reserve. It was always a stupid and selfish decision to reverse the status of a natural reserve which had been acquired with such difficulty by people who actually cared about our wildlife. The presence of the koala emphasises the tragic folly of this decision. Please write to Frankston Council and these parliamentarians: lily.d'[email protected] (Yes, this is the e-mail address from her parliamentary web page - Ed); [email protected]; [email protected].
[Koala Photo credit to Sue Chan.]
Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula wildlife are under assault from human expansion under the Victorian Government program to grow our population whether we like it or not. The very least that could be done would be to try to have decent protective reserves for the animals that remain and which make this area so special.
Apparently, however, Parks Victoria - who have taken over the management of a reserve until recently designated for wildlife protection as Frankston Nature Conservation Reserve - are going to tear down the fences and allow 24hr access to this park. Parks Victoria are known for their very inadequate attitude towards native animals. See: /taxonomy/term/1112.
We already have a terrible problem with mountain bikes vandalising many areas of natural vegetation that are open to the public. Australia is also prey to many acts of cruelty towards our native wildlife. Opening the park to public recreational activities will drive all wildlife out of it and endanger any that attempt to take refuge there.
Koalas are terribly rare in Frankston and on the whole Mornington Peninsula.
The decision to make the park available to the public for recreational activities is so, so ignorant and short-sighted.
Furthermore, the safety and security of the houses near this reserve, which is in a developed area, will also be in danger endangered by 24 hour public access to such an unfenced ungated area.
Please try to get this decision reversed. It is impossible to engineer our population density and numbers upwards and protect native animals if they are in open reserves.
After years of residents battling to preserve Frankston Reservoir as a safe habitat for indigenous flora and fauna by preventing it being used for boating, biking etc, instead keeping it for passive enjoyment of nature, the latest Frankston ALP member has clawed it back under the management of the discredited Parks Victoria.
The Andrews Labor Government recently decided to not renew a community Committee of Management as managers of the Frankston Nature Conservation Reserve for a further
period at the expiration of its term last March. Wildlife experts, hydrologists, conservation management specialists, friends’ groups and community members are shocked and outraged by this decision.
The volunteer community Committee of Management are all local residents of Frankston who are highly qualified with expertise in diverse professional fields. They have given endless hours of their time, at no cost to ratepayers and, with the support of local community groups and organisations, have been highly successful and prudent in managing all operations.
Detailed and approved management plans, policies and programs for the wellbeing of the Reserve for generations to come have been put in place.
Thanks to the voluntary efforts of the Committee and over 300 Friends, the Reserve has been opened to the public for the first time in 100 years for recreational enjoyment and activities that complement the serious conservation work of safeguarding and enhancing Frankston’s extremely depleted native fauna and flora.
More than 7000 enthusiastic visitors to the Reserve in the past four years can testify to the highly successful management practices and outcomes.
Local jobs are lost.
Local investment is lost.
Our community loses.
Our Member of Parliament, Paul Edbrooke, has turned his back on the Frankston community. The Reserve is now set to cost the taxpayer many millions of dollars in operational costs under management by a government body. A great outcome?
Source: Press Release sent on May 5, 2017 from Frankston Nature Conservation Reserve Committee of Management Inc.
Not only does the avenue of Elms in University Square provide an irreplaceable oasis amidst the busy, traffic-ridden surrounding streets, the trees are also home to countless Microbats, Rainbow Lorikeets and Possums, native species whose survival depends on using hollows and trunks for habitat. There is nowhere within the precinct to re-locate these animals who will surely perish under the planned chainsaw massacre foreshadowed by Melbourne City Council’s University Square Master Plan. The proposed removal of University Square’s elms adds to the devastating effect of around 900 established trees to be sacrificed to the metro rail tunnel with unimaginable impact on native animals across inner Melbourne.
Between 8.30 and 9 pm one evening this week a friend and I counted 30 possums emerging from tree dens, after watching with delight countless rainbow lorikeets returning to their breeding hollows, in the very trees designated for initial removal.
We are currently in discussion with project coordinators to develop a plan to rescue and relocate the native creatures that now call University Square home,whilst knowing well that the level of disruption this process will involve is potentially life threatening. No rescue plan will fully protect the animals who have lived and bred in this habitat for generations and,together with the old trees, enhance and vitalise an otherwise sterile environment.
Considering that under current law relocation of possums must take place within a 50 metres radius of their original habitat there are no suitable trees outside of University Square itself where relocation can take place.. When the Lorikeets return to their nesting hollows next year, as they do annually, the trees will be gone. Possums will be cast adrift to die on the busy roads bordering the park.
It would be wisdom, especially in the face of gathering public disapproval of the proposed plan, to renew park flora gradually by planting new trees between the old so that they will grow and replace each dying tree incrementally over time.Wooden nesting boxes can be installed in remaining trees providing new homes for displaced possums within their familiar habitat.
The wanton destruction of trees that continue to fulfil a multiplicity of critical roles in our climate-challenged environment is unjustifiable given alternative approaches can be applied that save the trees while meeting urban planning goals.
NOTE There is still time to modify the University Square Master Plan. Become familiar with the proposed plan at: www.melbourne.vic.gov.au/universitysquare and lodge objections and suggestions to Steve Perumal, Email: [email protected]
For more details on the perils faced by Melbourne’s elms see article “ Melbourne’s elms are under threat” recently published in The Age:
http://www.theage.com.au/comment/melbournes-elms-are-under-threat-20161216-gtchi1.html
The Baird government's controversial biodiversity laws have passed their final hurdle in parliament, with NSW farmers set to get greater power to clear their land from next year. The legislation will replace the Native Vegetation Act, which was designed to prevent mass land clearing. Thousands of possums, quolls, koalas and gliders will be killed each year if Premier Mike Baird scraps our tree-clearing laws. Nationals MPs, big agri-business and developers want to allow landholders trash our precious woodlands and urban bushland by replacing the Native Vegetation Act with weaker tree-clearing controls.
The Hon. Josh Frydenberg MP
Minister for the Environment and Energy
Dear Minister
End the senseless destruction of our wildlife - stop the carnage and destruction in NSW
The Baird government's controversial biodiversity laws have passed their final hurdle in parliament, with NSW farmers set to get greater power to clear their land from next year.
The legislation will replace the Native Vegetation Act, which was designed to prevent mass land clearing.
Thousands of possums, quolls, koalas and gliders will be killed each year if Premier Mike Baird scraps our tree-clearing laws. Nationals MPs, big agri-business and developers want to allow landholders trash our precious woodlands and urban bushland by replacing the Native Vegetation Act with weaker tree-clearing controls. These changes will:
-add extinction pressures to our state's 1000 threatened species;
-threaten our clean, reliable water supplies;
-turn our fertile land into wasteland through erosion and salinity;
-put landmark trees and bushland at risk; and
-add further to Australia's carbon pollution.
In 2015, a study by NSW Parks and Wildlife found that 60,000 hectares was being cleared per year in the state — a four-fold increase on previous State Government figures.
Professor Hugh Possingham warned that rather than protecting biodiversity, the laws would allow a doubling of broad-scale clearing that would put some native animals at risk of extinction.
The primary objections of Professor Possingham are that the government is proposing self-assessable codes that will result in broad-scale land clearing, thus degrading soil, water and biodiversity, and that the ‘no net loss’ standard against which clearing should be measured has not made the draft legislation. Despite the weight of scientific expertise opposed to the legislation the Baird Government has pressed on regardless. How are those with short-term, vested interests in monetary gain, allowed to determine their own rate of land clearing? Environmental protection is in everybody's interests, and that of future generations. Eradicating habitat is a silver-bullet for more threatened species, and native flora and fauns extinctions - already we have one of the highest rates in the modern world! Tourist come to see, and rightly expect to see, our wonderful mega-diverse range of iconic native species - vegetation, marsupials, birds, and other native wildlife. They don't want to see barren, cleared landscapes, urban sprawl and industries!
The current laws are supposed to prevent that kind of clearing without permits. The changes, which the government says were developed through a "rigorous, transparent, scientific and evidence-based process," allow farmers more freedom to clear their land without having to find equivalent areas of offsets. This is vandalism, and not only will we lose precious biodiversity functions, and native animals/birds, but we will see more desertification in the future - hardly the route to more production and more food!
The Sydney Basin, for instance, has some 1900 koalas under limited protection, with about 300 of the marsupials resident near Campbelltown one of the areas with rapid housing growth. This is because our rate of immigration is set on full-throttle levels - and not inevitable.
Last year 47,000 native animals and birds were killed in NSW by property owners using a "s121 licence". Each licence strictly controls the number of animals permitted to killed, and requires data to be lodged with the Office of Environment and Heritage. The office issued permits for 34 species, or a total of 145,550 animals and birds to be killed in 2015-16. This included more than 100,000 eastern grey kangaroos, almost 9000 corellas, 6500 sulphur crested cockatoos, 5500 galahs, 655 emus, 175 swamp wallabies, 113 wombats and 83 magpies. What sort of department of "Environment and Heritage" actually gives out so many permits to kill off native species? Some Orwellian oxymoron? They are killing off the ENVIRONMENT, habitat, biodiversity and vandalizing NSW's natural HERITAGE. How can this horrendous carnage be permitted, or justified?
Almost 1000 species of plants and animals are currently endangered in NSW, mainly due to land clearing. Over 40% of the state has already been cleared for agriculture, mining and development purposes and of what’s left, just 9% is in good condition. This leaves very little room for our native animals to maintain their homes. Since the "bad old days" of colonisation, and ignorance, biodiversity has been in steady decline in NSW. For the last 10 years, previous Governments have been working hard to halt and improve this decimation of our local plants and animals, armed with two environment protection acts – the 1995 Threatened Species Conservation Act and the 2003 Native Vegetation Act. They aren’t perfect but the World Wildlife Fund reckons these laws have saved the lives of around 250 000 of our furry amigos to date, including koalas and other native animals.
So why the new Colonial land-clearing permits, a return to the dark ages of ignorance, and law-less-ness? What about the national laws and policies that protect our native species?
The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) is the Australian Government's central piece of environmental legislation. It provides a legal framework to protect and manage nationally and internationally important flora, fauna, ecological communities and heritage places defined in the Act as matters of national environmental significance.
Specifically, the EPBC Act aims to:
-conserve Australia? biodiversity
-protect biodiversity internationally by controlling the international movement of wildlife
-provide a streamlined environmental assessment and
-approvals process where matters of national environmental significance are involved
-protect our world and national heritage
-promote ecologically sustainable development.
So, why isn't this Act being implemented against the rogue Baird government? What are our Environment ministers doing to stop the Baird governments vandalism, and destruction?
Vivienne Ortega
Secretary, Australian Wildlife Protection Council
This week Craig Thomson, President of the Australian Wildlife Protection Council, is working on a submission to oppose the rezoning of Melbourne Water land in Rosebud South. Unfortunately he has run into problems getting appropriate ecological information about the site. He wonders if the State Government and Melbourne water have deliberately made the ecological report unavailable. The fauna report relies solely on a habitat assessment and a desktop study for threatened species.
AWPC President, Mr Thomson, says that the absence of on ground fauna surveys is very alarming that there was no on ground fauna surveys. He asks,
"Is this now what happens when the state government tries to fast track rezoning crown land for commercial profit. Or, worse, has it become common practice? It seems like a little of both. Either way this lack of survey will miss the Eastern grey kangaroos, koalas, swamp wallabies and echidnas that survive on this urban fringe. It also misses the potential for threatened species to be present on site. Any potential development on this site could be the difference between extinction or survival of local biodiversity."
"That is is not good enough."
See the information provided below. For more about the site go to http://www.dtpli.vic.gov.au/planning/about-planning/planning-services-directory/fast-track-government-land-service/181-jetty-road,-rosebud.
All submissions must be directed to the Advisory Committee and will be treated as public documents. If you would like to make a presentation at the Public Hearing, you must make a written submission and complete the relevant section of the online form.
Make your submission and comments here before 9 December 2016
5 Fauna
A fauna assessment of the study area consisted of an on-foot field survey of habitat quality and a desktop assessment of the likelihood of fauna species of conservation significance occurring within the study area. A detailed zoological survey comprising a range of techniques over different seasons was not undertaken for this study as it was beyond the scope of works.
5.1 Pre-existing information search
The Victorian Biodiversity Atlas (VBA) was queried for threatened fauna species recorded within a 5 km radius of the study area (DSE 2013a). Appendix 4 provides the results of this query.
The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 Protected Matters Search Tool (PMST) on the Commonwealth Department of Environment (DoE), website was queried to determine if any protected fauna related matters not reported in the VBA query are considered likely to occur within the study area. Species identified in the EPBC query are presented in Appendix 5.
5.2 Fauna Habitat
Vegetation in the study area is likely to provide suitable foraging and nesting habitat for a range of common fauna species such as common woodland birds and arboreal mammals such as Common Ringtail Possum Pseudocheirus peregrinus. However, based on habitat requirements for a range of threatened fauna species that are known to occur locally and the poor site condition and fragmented landscape, it is considered unlikely that the vegetation on the site would serve as critical or limiting habitat for significant fauna species.
The majority of threatened fauna species previously recorded within the 5km search area or predicted to occur are considered unlikely to utilise the study area. The low likelihood rating is based on various factors including, lack of suitable habitat, lack of recent database records or the predicted location being outside of the known habitat range of current species populations. One listed species, Powerful Owl Ninox strenua occupies a large home range and as such may utilise sections of the study area for occasional foraging. However vegetation throughout the site is considered unlikely to provide limiting or critical habitat for this species as the site supports few large or hollow bearing trees.
Recently I became very distressed to hear of a looming dispersal of hundreds of thousands of flying foxes at Bateman's Bay. I read the ecologist's report and Plan of Management, which strongly recommended against dispersal, then wrote a submission (on behalf of the Threatened Species Conservation Society) to Minister Greg Hunt and Eurobodalla Shire council. Since then I discovered that there are similar situations of smaller magnitude occurring here in Tweed shire, along with wherever they occur. So I wrote letters to the local papers. Following is my submission and letter to the editor. [Editor: This article, first published on 2016-06-09 was overlooked and has just now been put on front page, with a new date and thanks.]
We are living in the 6th Mass Extinction of species. Australia has the world’s worst record for mammal extinctions. Here is one more example of why the list of extinct species is growing – governments are failing to adequately protect the environment.
In their nightly foraging, flying foxes fly from tree to tree, dusted with flower pollen or eject the seeds of fruit eaten, inadvertently regenerating woodlands and forests by dispersing up to 60,000 seeds each every night. Many eucalypts produce most of their nectar at night to attract these exceptional pollinators. Flying about 20-50 km a night between food trees and their camp, this keystone species maintain the genetic diversity of native trees and reforest gaps. This ecosystem service will become increasingly important to facilitate the flow of adaptive genes between trees, assist plant movement and assist the survival of many other species.
As a keystone species already in decline and vulnerable to extinction, the protection of flying foxes is tantamount. If flying foxes become extinct we are doomed. Without flying foxes we would have no more forests including World Heritage forests and hardwood forests, melaleucas, banksias, eucalypts and about 1/3rd of all fruit that relies on flying foxes to pollinate them (bananas, cashews, avocados, dates, mangoes, peaches, paw paw, durian). Scientists regard the loss of pollinators as the most serious issue facing mankind.1.
The Bateman’s Bay population of grey-headed flying foxes (GHFF) is a Matter of National Environmental Significance (MNES) i.e. there has been a population of at least 10,000 every year for 10 consecutive years. But now there are over 100,000 flying foxes at Bateman’s Bay. There are estimated to be 680,000 GHFF total.
In the 2009 Recovery Plan it was noted that shooting flying foxes had diminished due to subsidies by NSW government for netting. However habitat loss is increasing and there is lack of food. For example extensive clearing on the coast for agriculture results in flying foxes losing weight, having higher mortality and lower reproduction levels. Their populations are not bouncing back. They are suffering ongoing deterioration in condition as they explore new areas e.g. inland Adelaide and Wagga Wagga. Due to food shortages they are forced to eat marginal food such as privet and green figs and are establishing satellite sites a distance from their camp.
Grey-headed Flying Foxes are protected by the National Parks & Wildlife Act, 1974, Threatened Species Conservation Act, 1995, Environmental Protection & Biodiversity Conservation Act, 1999 and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature – Red List of Threatened Species.
Already flying fox populations are impacted by heatstress from very hot weather (>38 degrees C), droughts, cyclones, bushfire. They don’t need the additional threat of dispersal at a time when they are starving from lack of food sources.
Why create an exception just because local residents are unwilling to live in harmony with them? If dispersal is approved, it is likely to set a dangerous precedent for people in other locations to demand dispersal of flying foxes in their area too.
There is an overwhelming number of reasons why dispersal, especially of such a large camp, should not go ahead. As you may know from the review by Roberts and Eby of 17 Flying Fox Camp dispersals4:-
* In all cases, dispersed animals did not abandon the local area
• In 16 of the 17 cases, dispersals did not reduce the number of flying foxes in a local area
• Dispersed animals did not move far (in approx. 63% of cases the animals only moved
• In all cases, it was not possible to predict where replacement camps would form
• Conflict was often not resolved. In 71% of cases conflict was still being reported either at the original site or within the local area years after the initial dispersal actions
• Repeat dispersal actions were generally required (all cases except extensive vegetation removal)
• The financial costs of all dispersal attempts were high ranging from tens of thousands of dollars for vegetation removal to hundreds of thousands for active dispersals (e.g. using noise, smoke etc)
We understand that previous attempts at Batemans Bay also were not successful, success being defined as no more conflicts, no flying fox mortalities and permanent relocation elsewhere. The following are more reasons not to disperse:-
• Dispersal is highly stressful for bats and often leads to injuries or fatalities
• Very expensive (for Batemans Bay $57,800 pd for dispersal team, $1500 pd for ecologist, $5000 for management team = $6.2 million + $1 million contingency plan for the 3 stages (first year only). More for subsequent years and must cover up to 3 years
• Dispersal is planned for July-August. Approvals and preparations may take 2 months in the months of May/June. However September-October is when the bats are in late stages of pregnancy or have dependent young so very high risk of mortalities/injuries then
• 70 personnel will be required over 8 weeks, 50% of whom need to be vaccinated (most will not be locals)
• Wildlife caring groups have to struggle to help injured and orphaned bats, pay for veterinary care all without adequate financial assistance from council or government when they are already stretched thin and short of volunteers
• In the week after dispersal begins, teams need to locate injured, orphaned and dead flying foxes (p.18 of Ecological Australia’s Camp Dispersal Plan recommends that ‘no deaths or injuries’ be permitted). Trigger to stop dispersal is visibly pregnant females or with young
• More power outages will occur as bats fly around longer each morning during dispersal, becoming electrocuted on power lines
• Animal cruelty issues
• Risk of dispersed bats dying of starvation or further losing condition since they are already hungry
• Only 5% chance of success
• Dispersal disturbs residents during pre-dawn (smoke, flashing lights and noise) for the first 8 weeks initially then thereafter each time there is a dispersal. The most distressed the bats are, the noisier which in turn disturbs residents
• Bats must relocate 20km minimum during which time there is increased risk of fecal drop and disease due to stress
• Bats could relocate to unsuitable locations during dispersal for which council would be financially responsible to manage. Council could end up bankrupt if there are too many unsuitable relocations and ongoing dispersals
• As a species vulnerable to extinction in the next 25-100 years, dispersal risks their long-term survival. In fact 30% of the species died between 1989 – 1998 due to dispersals and since then their decline has been accelerated precisely due to dispersals and relocations.
• As a keystone species whose survival is required by many other species of plants and animals, their extinction would have far-reaching and devastating consequences for the entire Eurobodalla area, not just Bateman’s Bay.
We understand that Eurobodalla council has already done the following in an attempt to deal with the situation, i.e.:-
• Cleared buffers between camp and properties
• Offered subsidised services (guerneys, car and washing line covers)
• Removed 12 cocos trees,
• Slashed, mowed, pruned
• Given out informational brochures on flying foxes
1) Education - It is critically important that residents, whether they are affected or not, clearly understand:-
a) The irreplaceable ecosystem services of flying foxes i.e. pollination of native trees (including World Heritage forests, hardwood forests, banksias, melaleucas, eucalypts etc) in the area. Flying foxes are the #1 pollinator of forests, who on their nightly foraging increase the genetic strength of plants, preventing inbreeding. Without flying foxes we would have no avocadoes, bananas, durian, cashews, dates, mangoes, peaches or paw paw. And without forests we would have less oxygen in our atmosphere.
b) Fears of disease from GHFFs must also be allayed since bats have no more diseases than any other wild animal and diseases like Lyssavirus and rabies cannot be contracted except via body fluids. It is not possible for humans to contract Hendra virus directly from flying foxes, only via infected horses.
c) A comprehensive education/advertising program must be undertaken to eradicate the common perception of bats as ‘pests’ to be culled or relocated. This should ideally include TV advertisements, articles and radio interviews so that Australians across the country become educated. Wildlife carers could be paid to take orphaned bats to schools so children can see how adorable they are and the reasons why they need our protection. I cannot overemphasise the importance of education as Australians commonly have an attitude that native animals (not just flying foxes) are ‘pests’. The prevailing public hysteria around bats needs to be defused urgently and that includes dealing with residents’ irrational fear of disease and the importance of wildlife-friendly netting for fruit trees.
2) Big Picture Explanation - Secondly, residents need to understand the reason why there are so many bats at Bateman’s Bay ie. we humans have taken away their habitat and therefore are now paying the price.
3) Tolerance - Help people learn to live in peace with flying foxes, such as:-
* Try to become quieter. Bats stress out and become noisier if people are mowing etc
* Double-glaze windows to cut down on noise.
* Park cars under cover.
* Place washing lines in the open away from trees and night-time flight paths.
* Use ear muffs at night to sleep and air purifiers for those who dislike the smell
It’s by far easier to adapt human behaviour to bats, than the other way around.
4) Repercussions - People need to seriously consider the adverse effects of no forests or native trees. What kind of future will there be for our children and grandchildren? How will they cope with less availability of certain fruits, less oxygen and more Co2 in the atmosphere from no forests?
5) Tourism Opportunities - Eco-tourism needs to be promoted so local businesses can flourish and benefit from the amazing spectacle of thousands of bats leaving their camp at sunset. This would help locals to appreciate bats for the increased tourism to their shire. Flying foxes have so many gifts to offer us if only we could get beyond the mental fixation that they are a nuisance.
6) Business Opportunities - Perhaps some enterprising person can start a business selling organic bat manure which is bound to be highly beneficial to gardens.
7) Improved gardens - Local residents can benefit from free fertiliser per compliments of the flying foxes. Some residents say gardening is impossible but bats aren’t flying around in the day. Perhaps those residents should try gardening in the daytime and not after sunset and pre-dawn when the bats are most active.
8) Deal-Breaking - Instead of spending $6-$7+ million on dispersal, council could:-
i) offer to buy back worst affected properties
ii) waive council rates for at least the period that flying foxes are present
iii) employ council officers to guerney residents’ driveways, cars etc regularly
iv) offer free air purifiers for house interiors
v) supply industrial grade ear muffs to help people sleep
vi) supply under-cover parking for those without a carport. Temporary carports can be as cheap as $150 from supercheapauto and quite durable
vii) offer the community the chance to spend this money any way they wish in lieu of dispersal e.g. new sports stadium
While all these ideas cost council money, the bottom line is they cost a lot less than dispersal without the disastrous impacts on threatened keystone species.
9) Getting to the Cause - The big-picture/long-term solution is to:-
• plant more flowering natives in bat-friendly areas (near water, in a gully) where people will never live nearby
• stop the deforestation of flowering eucalypts that flying foxes should be feeding on in winter which drive hungry flying foxes to the coast to ravage orchards
• create alternative flying fox roosting locations that include native food trees so that flying foxes don’t rely on orchards and therefore impinge upon humans. Non-residential urban areas such as parklands, golf courses and even cemeteries can be planted with a range of native trees that provide fruit (small-leaved figs) and nectar (eucalypts and melaleucas). This would provide feeding sites away from residential areas and corridors for them to travel between remnant forests. If these natural food sources are available when commercial fruit trees are bearing fruit, flying foxes are less likely to become a problem.
• a camp may be encouraged to move (which is not the same as forced relocation) and can be done by planting roost trees further away from houses. Surveys of flying-fox camps in New South Wales have shown that a distance of as little as 100 metres from neighbouring houses can be enough to reduce the noise level of a flying-fox camp to an acceptable level.
• Remove the lower branches of trees and clearing the understorey, to create a buffer between roosting animals and surrounding residents. Such actions would need to be undertaken carefully, preferably in conjunction with the creation of suitable habitat elsewhere, and subject to a monitoring program. Further research needs to be done into the factors influencing the establishment and persistence of flying fox camps.2.
• Low, dense trees and shrubs planted around fence lines also form a barrier that flying-foxes are unlikely to roost in3.
• Incorporate a buffer zone between the building and roost trees that ideally should not be paved or made of concrete in order to reduce mess problems. Plant low growing fragrant shrubs in this zone to minimise future encroachment by the animals into the site and reduce odour problems. Planting tall trees will only eventually bring the animals closer in to the development.
• Worst case scenario if everything else fails, dangle electric wire from the trees which the bats touch and it gives them a small electric shock, and then they go away. While it's only a small shock, still it's better than being killed.
10) All About Timing - The camp will reduce in size in the next few weeks or months so people could wait patiently, most of the flying foxes will leave when the flowering season of spotted gum, red bloodwood, and blackbutt begins to decline. Or at the very least wait till early February when juveniles will be independent, recommended by Ecologic Australia. Success is more likely if dispersal takes place when the camp is smaller and outside bats’ sensitive life cycles.
All affected residents at Batemans Bay moved into their houses knowing full-well that flying foxes lived nearby since they have had at least 10,000 flying foxes per year for the last ten years. It is reasonable to expect that the flying foxes would breed and expand their population (as with human populations).
For governments to bend over backwards and break important rules and regulations that are in place to protect our environment and especially threatened species to appease people who lack the tolerance, compassion and understanding of bats is a grave error, one that we will pay for long into the future should the bats become extinct.
The Threatened Species Conservation Society Inc. sincerely hopes that the Eurobodalla council and the Federal Government will at least try a bit harder to solve this problem instead of going down the route of dispersal which is guaranteed to fail and be hugely expensive, for the sake of our little forest-makers.
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqsXc_aefKI
2. www.jcu.edu.au/rainforest/issues/ITFL_flyingfox.pdf
3. http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/wildlife-ecosystems/wildlife/living_with_wildlife/flyingfoxes/
4. http://www.esc.nsw.gov.au/inside-council/council/meetings/2016/may/ordinary-council-meeting-10-may-2016/Batemans-Bay-Flying-fox-Camp-Dispersal-Plan.pdf
Dear Editor
Conflict between flying foxes and humans in our shire is so disconcerting. Humans have destroyed 75% of pre-colonial forests for logging, mining, livestock grazing, industries, cities and housing. We continue to take from the land whatever resources we need to make ourselves comfortable (computers, TVs, cars, refrigerators, mobile phones, iPads etc).
But when the flying foxes are too close to our schools and homes, screeching and squabbling all day with a smell we dislike, we scream ‘they have to go’! But where? We have taken away their habitat, their food sources and now they are becoming permanent fugitives as they go from place to place, exhausted, starving, stressed, moved on by humans whose needs are judged more important than the needs of a species on the tipping point of extinction. This situation will worsten as time goes on with increasing habitat loss due to human overpopulation and encroachment onto their land.
Flying fox populations have declined 95% in the last century and 30% since 1988 and are vulnerable to extinction. Their ecosystem services of night-time pollination is without compare. Every night they fly up to 50km dispersing approximately 60,000 seeds each. What does it mean if they become extinct? Simply this – no more World Heritage forests, hardwood forests, melaleucas, banksias, eucalypts and about a third of all fruit (including bananas, avocadoes, mangoes, peaches, pawpaw, cashews). And fewer trees mean less oxygen to breathe.
Our preoccupation with creature comforts is trivial in comparison. Shouldn’t we be incredibly grateful to this keystone species whose existence is critically important for so many other species including ourselves? Shouldn’t we be a bit more tolerant? From a bat’s perspective we are the ones who are stinky, filthy, noisy pests!
They are not the one with outrageously loud ‘music’ festivals and doof music blaring from their noisy cars and radios! They are not the one brushcutting, mowing on tractors, bulldozers and earthmoving equipment tearing up our habitat! Nor are they the ones stinking up the environment with their cigarettes, chemical sprays, chimney smoke and hazard reduction burns! Flying foxes are not pouring their feces and cow sewage into the ocean. No, it is us who are the pests. Additionally they are native whereas we are ferals having just arrived in this land 230 years ago.
Humans have had it good for too long. If we can’t live in harmony with other species in an ecocentric vs anthropocentric way, we too will head for extinction.
If aliens were watching us they would probably think we were the stupidest creature on the planet. Either that or that psychopaths were running the country.
Maryland Wilson, President of the Australian Wildlife Protection Council, announced today (June 30, 2015) that Queensland LNP Senator Barry O’Sullivan will have a singular focus when he spearheads an Australian government trade delegation to China to try to seal the deal on kangaroo meat exports. #kangaroo #exploitation. The Trans Pacific Partnership agreements, if they go through, would worsen the already terrible situation of many Australian native animals and could provoke species extinctions.
Calling to friends of wildlife, and drawing attention to the plight of kangaroos as particularly urgent, President Wilson said:
"This is a huge issue now.
We could lose our independence as a nation with global trade agreements
Kangaroos will be global 'asset', not just our native wildlife, protected as they are,
With more than 1.3 billion people in China, with an appetite for kangaroo meat, it's unsustainable. Nobody really knows how many kangaroos in Australia, and numbers have plummeted in NSW. They are hated because they cause "grazing pressure" (they eat grass!) and the government wants every blade for livestock - despite the drought over Queensland."
Donate to the AWPC to help Maryland's entirely volunteer non-profit organisation continue its great service to Australian wildlife. AWPC is a tiny organisation that punches above its weight, made up largely of hands-on activists. Download the AWPC Donation form.
Compassion was a far more effective environmental management tool than “poison and guns,” award winning ecologist Dr Arian Wallach told a recent conference of conservationists and farmers. And dingoes were an ideal agent for saving the environment and promoting co-existence between native and exotic species. The May 17, 2015 conference, “Dingo – Friend or Foe” was held at Hervey Bay Community Centre, just across the Great Sandy Straits from World Heritage listed Fraser Island where, it was argued, Australia’s war on the dingo began. Three prominent local farmers, Harry Jamieson, Lindsay Titmarsh and James Hansen told the conference of dingo problems, worse in recent years than ever before. (Article by Arthur Gorrie. )
Researcher and grazier Adam O’Neill said the national “war on the dingo” which followed the death of a boy, Clinton Gage on Fraser Island in 2001 had caused a significant worsening of the problems it was supposed to address.
Farmers concerned about problems with dingoes, wild pigs and native and exotic herbivores, in numbers never seen before, needed to ask why government agencies were disrupting natural balances by baiting in national parks and other crown land.
Arian Wallach:
Dr Wallach, whose work has been published in the international journals Nature and Science, said human attempts to manage the environment by killing came with high costs – ethical, economic, social and environmental.
Winner of the 2013 Eureka Science prize (Australia’s foremost research award) for work on the ecological role of dingoes, she advocated greater humility from the scientific community.
“We need to be very humble in what we think we know and don’t know,” she said.
Agriculture needed to focus more on non-lethal control methods, including guardian dogs. But although human persecution was the main threat to large carnivores worldwide, it was not farmers who posed the main danger. “The most dangerous place for a dingo is in national parks,” she said.
“Unlike national parks in other countries where the authorities protect the predators, dingoes are not protected anywhere.
“Foxes are common where dingoes are scarce. Where there are many dingoes, there are fewer foxes. Foxes are strongly associated with the extinction of marsupials. Where dingoes do well, marsupials are also doing well, essentially across the entire continent. Where dingoes are persecuted we get more stock losses, not less.”
She also attacked the “wild dog” concept, which she said was “perfect” as a public relations tool to justify extermination, implying that problem animals were not really dingoes.
“The wild dogs are dingoes,” she said.
Harry Jamieson:
Retired beef cattle grazier, agricultural public servant and conservationist Harry Jamieson, told about 80 participants (including three dingoes and one assistance dog) about his experience on land frequented by dingoes, kangaroos and wallabies as well as stock. He spoke as a former president of the Mary River Catchment Co-ordinating Committee, which has been active in conservation efforts for the endangered Mary River turtle, cod and lungfish.
Mr Jamieson said he had operated a family beef property in dingo country and had never suffered any calf losses as a result of dingo predation.
“Often we would hear them howling. Kangaroos and wallabies were numerous. I never shot or allowed anyone to shoot a kangaroo or wallaby. They were for the dingoes.
“You hear so much about dingoes causing a lot of people to incur losses… and you have to have sympathy. Over the years it’s been baiting, trapping and shooting. It doesn’t seem to have made a lot of difference. We’ve got to take a different approach,” he said.
Lindsay Titmarsh:
Grazier Lindsay Titmarsh, of the Tandora property at the Mary River mouth told of an unprecedented recent increase in dingo numbers.
He said his family had shot and trapped dingoes at times over the years but they had always been in small groups and did not seem to breed up.
“If you see a dog every two months, you’re doing well, (but) we have shot 16 dingoes in the last five months, that’s unheard of at Tandora. I don’t know what the story is. They just keep coming, from everywhere. We lost 20 calves in one year.”
James Hansen:
Dairy farmer, Fraser Coast Regional councillor and a member of the council’s Koala Conservation Committee, James Hansen said he remembered it once being rare to see a dingo.
“Then about 10 years ago, something strange began happening. We lost 30 weener heifers in one year. They cost about $1000 each to replace and would earn $10,000 over their lifetime.
“I really couldn’t sleep at night. Then they struck during the day and took to eating calves as they were born. I don’t know where they came from.”
Adam O’Neill:
Mr O’Neill said the evidence from farmers of problems becoming much worse in recent years supported his contention that they coincided with national persecution of the dingo, which he said had started with the Beattie Queensland Government, after the Clinton Gage tragedy.
This caused over-breeding, hybridisation and changes in behaviour.
He said he and Dr Wallach had conducted the experiment that proved his point while managing the Evelyn Downs cattle station in central Australia.
“I decided not to kill any dogs and within two years, stock predation was eliminated.
“You need dingoes to stabilise everything. When dingoes are stable they become invisible and no-one notices the good things they do. People only notice dingoes when they become a problem.
“Stop the baiting, let the dingoes stabilise and they’ll control the pigs and foxes and you’ll save a shitload of money,” he said.
“You’ve got to inquire how these government agencies are running our vast areas of wilderness. They’re baiting for no apparent reason. They don’t have livestock.”
Dr Wallach said consumers were the key to solving the problem.
“Do you want to put your money towards contributing to the persecution of big predators (to produce) wool or meat?”
She said a global “predator friendly” certification system already existed.
“As consumers we have an opportunity to make a choice about the kind of human beings we want to be. Being compassionate and not being so quick to use guns and poison, let’s put lethal control at the bottom of the list.”
Malcolm Kilpatrick:
Save Fraser Island Dingoes president Malcolm Kilpatrick cut his address short because of time constraints, but said the organisation had sought to make the island manager, the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service more free with information and had agitated for an animal care centre, especially for animals injured by humans. There was no real care facility except at the Seaworld and Australia Zoo tourist attractions. Of animals taken off the island for veterinary treatment, only a small number survived.
“As an ecologist I can tell you we do not understand eco-systems at all,” Dr Arian Wallach told the conference, which was facilitated by the Save Fraser Island Dingoes group.
Killing for conservation was a dangerous tactic.
“When we fix problems, we often create new ones.”
Cat eradication on Macquarie Island had been considered one of the great successes, because the cats were attacking native birds.“Then came rabbit and rat plagues.
“The rabbit plague caused a decline in plants and (as a result of plants no longer holding hillsides together) landslip destroyed birds’ nests.
“Then we spent millions of dollars to eliminate rabbits and rats and mice.
“What have we gained to justify these costs?
“Sometimes we have a win – once or twice.”
Killing foxes to save the (endangered small macropod) woylies was a big success initially.
“They were de-listed, but then we lost them anyway because, instead of being killed by foxes, they were wiped out by cats.
“When we pick out anything by itself we find it hitches to everything else.
“We have cats and foxes and cane toads and there is nothing that is going to change this.
“If we want an environment that includes bilbies and rock wallabies, maybe we have to envisage an eco-system where there is co-existence.
“The problem with cane toads is poison glands on their back. Where they come from predators all know that.”
There were now snakes with smaller mouths so they could only eat small toads and get a smaller dose of the poison. “Birds are figuring it out. They turn them over and eat from the underside.”
Attempts at dingo eradication were another example of ill-thought management.
“Ecosystem survival is determined by whether they have big predators.
“The oceans have sharks, while Australia has dingoes.
“When wolves were re-introduced to Yellowstone Park in 1995, they killed some animals and gave life to many others.
“Deer numbers had built up (eating away vegetation on the ground). This had affected trees, birds and beavers.”A Youtube video, Sustainable Man, which she showed, recorded the return of these species and improvements in river water quality as a result of the re-introduction of wolves.
“Apex predators drive eco-systems,” she said. “But with 94% of large carnivore species, the main threat is human persecution.”
In Australia, dingoes helped promote co-existence between native and exotic species, but “there is no safe place for dingoes, (because) unlike other national parks where authorities protect the predators, it is OK (in Australia) to poison-bait national parks and to kill dingoes on Fraser Island.”
Dingoes helped promote co-existence between native and exotic animals, many of which were here, like it or not.
“Since white people came, Australia is no longer isolated.
“Australia now has the world’s largest populations of wild horses and donkeys and is the only place in the world where there are wild camels.
“There are creatures that have been here for millions of years and ones we’ve brought here.
“What’s an animal to do when it’s brought here?”Introduced animals impacted the environment by using native resources and killing native animals and plants.
It seemed to be thought that by shooting and poisoning them, “we’ll get a proper Australian wilderness back the way it was.”“But killing for conservation bears high costs and responsibilities.
“We need to be clear if the cost is worth it, in view of the environmental problems we face.”
Large herbivores were in trouble around the world and many were extinct in their native range, or endangered.
“If we could snap our fingers and get rid of all wild camels in Australia, there would be no wild camels left in the world.”
There were none left in Israel, where Dr Wallach said she came from and part of the region where camels were generally supposed to be native.
They appeared to have originated in North America. “Should we send them back there?”
There were camel relatives in South America and in Mongolia they were “slaves.”
“This is the one place in the world they exist in the wild. If we eradicate them here, we are eradicating them globally,” she said.
On the early evening of Tuesday the 26 of May, the tranquil peace at Boneo was broken by the sounds of over 100 gun shots.
The farm responsible for these shots was carrying out a kangaroo cull. However in order to carry out the cull it looks to me as if they had to trespass on Melbourne Water land to get the kangaroos back on the farm.
As you can see in image 1.1 there is no available food on the farm as it has been cleared (cleared very recently in fact).
The tree line behind the cleared land is Melbourne Water land where the kangaroos are seeking refuge.
A couple of witnesses have claimed that they saw dogs released onto the adjoining Melbourne water land to chase the kangaroos back on the farm where they could be shot. Unfortunately 2 young joeys didn’t make it off the Melbourne Water land as they were killed by the dogs (see image 1.2 below of a joey carcass).
It is with much gratitude that I thank a concerned neighbour, who put out feed for the kangaroos who turned up for refuge on their property.
A team went out this morning to search for any injured and orphaned joeys. By the morning the kangaroos were back on the Melbourne Water land and very agitated. They saw us before we saw them and they fled from us to hide in the thick scrub. We were thus unable to get a good look at them, but it is of my belief there are most likely orphaned and injured Kangaroos in the mob.
We were also unable to find any of the shot kangaroos (we assume they were moved) and as such we have no idea of how many were shot. While we know that there were at least 2 joeys killed by dogs, there were another 4 adults hit and killed on the road in front of the farm (see images 1.3 and 1.4).
So after the search was undertaken today (but will continue over the week), actions were taken by the team to ensure that justice for these animals was secured. A complaint was registered, of an offence to wildlife with DELWHP. DELWHP have now started an investigation. Melbourne Water has been contacted and will be making an investigation. The police were called as well however they did not seem to concerned. The witnesses to last night’s atrocities have made formal statements to appropriate authorities and departments, and the RSPCA has been contacted as well.
While Kangaroos have been killed, exactly what took place last night is unclear as yet and any fault remains an allegation until the investigations are over and charges are either laid or not laid. However in these cases more often than not, if the accused is found guilty, a very small penalty is handed out. Such penalties present no deterrent to stop the offender from committing this crime again.
In this case a local supplier of everything from parsnips, iceberg lettuce, cabbage, silverbeet, celery and cos lettuce to a major supermarket chain has been accused of responsibility in this matter.
Story by
Craig Thomson
27/5/2014
Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee is one of fifty well-known authors and scientists who have signed this open letter to the Canberra public protesting the mass killing of kangaroos which has been taking place annually for some time in Canberra. For those interested in the history of this annual slaughter, Candobetter.net has published at length on this subject here: http://candobetter.net/SaveTheKangaroo. It is wonderful that a number of influential people have now put their names on the line to defend kangaroos from slaughter and kangaroo science from ideology. Many more people are also against this absurd and cruel practice. [Candobetter.net Editor: Republished from http://www.beautifulwild.com/. Also available here: http://www.arcohab.org/#!letter/c1yzj. Also the subject of an article in the Canberra Times.]
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PUBLIC OF CANBERRA
We the undersigned believe the need for a mass killing of kangaroos by the ACT Government is ill thought out and cannot be substantiated. The analysis in support of such a program fails the tests of good science, conservation, animal welfare, economy and humanity.
We understand that: no causal evidence of any rigorous kind has been provided that directly links kangaroo grazing on Canberra nature reserves with the demise of other small threatened species. No assessment of the subjective lives of native animals in Canberra’s nature reserves is provided as a clue to their survival. No commonly used non-lethal management tools have been advocated by those who believe in the negative impact of the current kangaroo population on the rest of the environment, despite considerable evidence over many years and in many places that they are effective.
The decision to proceed with the killing disregards the extreme brutality of the killing process. There has been no assessment of the impact of mass native animal killings on the local economy and society and our view is that these costs are substantial.
The scientifically substantiated appreciation of other animals’ cognitive, emotional and psychological capacities requires that we break the cycle of violence of conventional management methods. Abandoning such measures offers a unique opportunity to find innovative solutions which promote sustainability and reflect the desire of communities for peaceful coexistence with other creatures on the planet.
We therefore call for an immediate cessation of the mass killing of these native animals, and for a full and truly independent examination of the above-listed and other relevant matters by respected professionals.
Pam Ahern, Edgar's Mission Farm Sanctuary, Victoria
Dr Rosemary Austen, kangaroo rehabilitation and translocation expert, medical practitioner, ACT
Dr Jonathan Balcombe, biologist, author, Animal Studies Dept (Chair) Humane Society University, Washington D.C. (USA)
Marc Bekoff, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Colorado, Boulder (USA)
Dr Dror Ben-Ami, Co-founder and lead researcher, Centre of Compassionate Conservation, University of Technology Sydney.
Dr Jeffrey Borchers, ecologist, the Kerulos Center, USA
Dr Melissa Boyde, Australasian Animal Studies Association; Senior Research Fellow, Faculty of Law Humanities and the Arts, University of Wollongong
Gay Bradshaw, PhD (ecology), PhD (psychology), CEO The Kerulos Center (USA)
David Brooks, author, editor, Hon A/Prof, University of Sydney
J M Coetzee, writer
Claire Colebrook, Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of Literature, Pennsylvania State University (USA)
Dr Margo DeMello, PhD, Animals & Society Institute (USA)
Carolyn Drew, MAdEd, Executive Director of Regions, Institute for Critical Animal Studies
Lara Drew, Ph D candidate, Education, University of Canberra
Ray Drew, MA Communication Grad Cert Psychoanalytic Studies, Wildlife Photographer
Katrina Fox, journalist and author
Professor Steve Garlick, PhD, University of Technology, Sydney
Stephen Graham LLB, Virtual Lawyers and Mediators Pty Ltd.
Dr Jason Grossman, philosopher of science
Naomi Henry, Voiceless Council
Melanie Joy, PhD, Professor, University of Massachusetts, Boston; President, Beyond Carnism; Author
Professor Vrasidas Karalis, Modern Greek Studies, University of Sydney
John Kinsella, author, Professorial Research Fellow, UWA; Professor of Sustainability and Literature, Curtin University.
Lawyers for Animals
David Malouf, writer
Clare Mann, psychologist, author and Managing Director of Communicate31
Jeffrey Masson, Ph.D., Author
Alex Miller, writer
Raymond Mjadwesch, ecologist
Alison Moore, Ph.D., Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts, University of Wollongong
Nic Nassuet, singer/songwriter (USA)
Mark Pearson, member NSW Legislative Council
Teja Brooks Pribac, The Kerulos Center; PhD Candidate University of Sydney
Daniel Ramp, Ph.D., Director, Centre for Compassionate Conservation, University of Technology, Sydney
Tracy Ryan, author
Stephen Sewell, playwright
Lynda Stoner, Animal Liberation NSW
Bill Taylor Ph.D., retired CSIRO plant scientist
Maria Taylor Ph.D., science communication, author, newspaper publisher
Associate Professor Nik Taylor, School of Social and Policy Studies, Flinders University, South Australia
Marianne Thieme, Leader & Chair, Party for the Animals, The Netherlands
Dr Christine Townend, author, founder Animal Liberation, NSW, co-founder Animals Australia
Dr Richard Twine, Co-Director, Centre for Human-Animal Studies, Edge Hill University (UK)
Dinesh Joseph Wadiwel, Ph.D., Socio-Legal Studies and Human Rights, School of Social and Political Sciences, University of Sydney
Brenda Walker, writer, Winthrop Professor of English and Cultural Studies, University of Western Australia
Bren Weatherstone, M.Env Sci., teacher (ACT)
Elizabeth Webby, Professor Emerita, Australian Literature, University of Sydney
Dr Richard J. White, Senior Lecturer in Human Geography, Sheffield Hallam University (UK)
Professor Stuart White, Director, Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology, Sydney
Phil Wollen, OAM Founder of Winsome Constance Kindness Trust
Gypsy Wulff, Teacher, Author, Publisher, Founder of Spirit Wings Humane Education Inc.
Further action:
If you would like to help the campaign to stop the A.C.T. Government kill of kangaroos, please sign the Animals Australia petition: http://www.animalsaustralia.org/take_action/stop-kangaroo-slaughter-ACT
Petition to Shane Rattenbury, MLA, Minister for Territory and Municipal Services, A.C.T. : https://www.change.org/p/shane-rattenbury-end-the-cruel-slaughter-of-kangaroos-on-public-reserves
Link to The Alliance for Respectful Co-habitation: www.arcohab.org
Taking action! If you live in or near the Australian Capital Territory, and would like to help out in the field by helping to monitor the reserves, please email Carolyn Drew at [email protected]
Candobetter.net: Thank you to Brett Clifton for his wonderful site with photographs of many kangaroos at http://www.brettclifton.com/Welcome.html from which I have sourced the photographs in this article.
This article describes the important contribution of bandicoots to tree health and ecology. It raises the much wider costs of bandicoot extinction and tree die-off associated with such extinction.
Bandicoots are a unique marsupial abut the size of a guinea pig. Females have a pouch like kangaroos but their pouch is opening backwards so that the young have to get in and out through the “backdoor”. This is because bandicoots dig in the soil for grubs and, hence, would fill their pouch with soil.
They have a long nose with a highly developed olfactory system. Their long nose is lined with lots of sensitive receptors and neurons in order to detect food buried deep in the soil. They can detect the exact location of a grub 20 cm deep under the soil and pin-point exactly to it when digging for it.They dig very rapidly with their long fore-claws and within seconds they find their meal.
In addition, their conical diggings left behind are of great importance to the environment (Patricia Flemming etal). These diggings increase soil turnover, alter plant community composition and structure, trap rainwater for better water infiltration, capture bio-mater for nutrient cycling, and add to fungal and seed dispersal. The presence of diggings can also prevent tree mortality and tree-die-off while the dispersal of fungal spores will speed up leaf-litter break down and so reduce the fire hazard.
Sadly, bandicoots are extremely vulnerable to the introduced predators such as dogs, foxes and cats as well as the reduction and fragmentation of their habitat. One would think that the extreme usefulness and aesthetic value of these cute animals would be enough to want them to be protected at all cost.
Animals in the Wild is part of part of a campaign against recreational hunting, and in particular the photographic hunting competition run by Narooma’s Huntfest which will be returning this year as a fully fledged arms fair selling guns, ammunition and operating a mobile air range.
We are excited to announce that the Animals in the Wild photographic competition is relaunching for 2015, with entries opening on 5 May 2015.
The competition is part of our campaign against recreational hunting, and in particular the photographic hunting competition run by Narooma’s Huntfest which will be returning this year as a fully fledged arms fair selling guns, ammunition and operating a mobile air range.
We are extremely fortunate that renowned photographer Rex Dupain is again judging the competition. His professional eye and love of nature are a great support.
Animals in the Wild is encouraging animal lovers and nature enthusiasts to explore Australia’s beautiful forests, parks and nature reserves and, while we are all out there, to shoot with a camera, not a gun.
The prize of a $100 gift voucher will be awarded to the best picture in each of the following categories:
a. The image that most evokes a connection with an animal in the wild in Australia
b. The most beautiful image of a bird in the wild in Australia
c. The image that conveys the threats facing native animals in Australia
d. The image that best conveys the reality of the hunting, guns and killing culture in Australia
We look forward to receiving your entries; please forward the link to this page to any budding photographers who might also be interested in entering. If you have any questions please contact [email protected]
The winner will be announced on 6 June 2015 in Narooma.
You can also take a look at some of the best entries we received last year here.
Today at the Australian Wildlife Protection Council AGM I interviewed Craig Thomson, Animalia wildlife carer, about the events that may have led to Sean the Koala travelling down a busy highway in Langwarrin. Turns out he was probably following a traditional migratory route of male koalas in search of romance, which takes them from islands of habitat like the Cranbourne Botanical Gardens, down four-lane highways towards The Pines Flora and Fauna Reserve in Frankston, or further south, across the massive Peninsula Link tollway that cuts the Peninsula in half. Why are koalas being forced onto highways? It is another terrible cost of the unwanted human population expansion that is being forced on Victorians by the State Government, in its bid to grow Melbourne faster and faster. Animalia has $10,000 outstanding power bills; you can help by donating to WESTPAC BANK BSB 033138 Account 434072
The President of Animalia, Michelle Thomas, actually rescued Sean the Koala, but has received little credit. Instead, Wildlife Victoria is often erroneously named as the rescuing agency. In the mean time Animalia owes $10,000 in utility bills alone and the wildife carers wonder how they are going to keep going without donations. So please consider donating to WESTPAC BANK BSB 033138 Account 434072.
The photograph of a koala being carried away from a multi-lane highway by a resourceful and kind truck driver comes from South Australia, but the situation of koalas crossing dangerous roads is all too frequent.
Two really interesting and engaging videos of "Sqwark and Whiskey playing," from Bonnie Thomson's you-tube channel. In the second one the magpie hangs onto the dog's tail in a new kind of wrestling hold.
Bonnie Thomson's you-tube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCazbouA5IcnNSLWz22yV_Xw
Meet the impeccable Animalia wildlife carers at their stall at Tootgarook, 2nd February, 10am-3pm at Tootgarook Wetland Reserve, Truemans Rd Sports Reserve, Rosebud West 3940.
Animalia Shelter, Carer network and rescue service - Portsea to Brighton, 0435 822 699, All hours
www.animaliawildlife.org.au
Please consider making a Donation at any WESTPAC BANK BSB 033138 Account 434072 or Support Animalia through Ritchies Community Benefit cards organisation number 81621.
Welcome. I always worried about population but I believed the demographers who said it would take care of itself. They were wrong, so I stopped listening to them. I kicked off a national debate about this issue in 2009. The points I made were about endangered species, climate change, traffic, housing, and the cost of living and the problems of Australia at 36 million. In 2010 there was movement - from the Greens, the Liberals, Kevin Rudd at Easter establishing a Population Minister, and Julia Gillard renouncing Big Australia. The election came and went, but there was no action. I don't know why Julia never delivered on this - I personally think she might still be PM today if she had.
In political debate people are very frightened about being called racist or xenophobic. This is true of Prime Ministers and also of the people who live in our street. Yes there are racists out there, it's a pity, but it's true. But the use of the term racism has become a new kind of McCarthyism, used to stifle debate. Just as there were communists in the 1950s, but the fear of communists was used in an hysterical way to shut down and discredit and attack all kinds of political ideas that the McCarthyists disliked, so too now we see the name calling used to stifle and shut down debate on things we desperately need to debate.
How do we counter this?
It's not easy, but
1. We need to point out that Australia already is a multi-racial society - one quarter born overseas, one half with one or both parents born overseas. The bird has flown. No-one is trying to maintain Australia as a white Anglo Saxon outpost of the British Empire - it can't be done, and I haven't come across anyone who is trying.
2. As a consequence of this, our actions will assist, and are intended to assist, Victorians of all backgrounds. For example Broadmeadows has double digit unemployment. Many unemployed people in Broadmeadows are of Turkish background. They are entitled to our consideration, rather than running migrant worker programs that stuff up their ability to find work.
3. We need to point out that if talking about population makes us racists, we are in pretty good company. People don't usually think of Dr Martin Luther King as a white supremacist. What did he have to say about population? “Family planning, to relate population to world resources, is possible, practical and necessary. Unlike plagues of the dark ages or contemporary diseases we do not yet understand, the modern plague of overpopulation is solvable by means we have discovered and with resources we possess. What is lacking is not sufficient knowledge of the solution but universal consciousness of the gravity of the problem and education of billions who are its victims".
And people wouldn't ordinarily think of David Suzuki as a puppet or fellow traveller of Pauline Hanson. What did he have to say about population? Dr Suzuki said “of course human numbers are at the very core of our crisis.
The explosive rate of growth simply can't continue". And while we're at it, let me point out a few more. - John Stuart Mill, the great nineteenth century philosopher said " solitude, in the sense of being often alone, is essential to any depth of meditation or of character, and solitude in the presence of natural beauty and grandeur, is the cradle of thoughts and aspirations which are not only good for the individual, but which society could ill do without. Nor is there much satisfaction in contemplating the world with nothing left to the spontaneous activity of nature... Every hedgerow or superfluous tree rooted out, and scarcely a place left where a wild shrub or flower could grow without being eradicated as a weed in the name of improved agriculture".
Former US President Bill Clinton told the United Nations in 1993 that “to ensure a healthier and more abundant world, we simply must slow the world's explosive growth in population". And his Vice-President, Al Gore, said. Quote “I consider the dramatic growth in the world's population to be the greatest challenge currently facing the environment. ... He said the "effects of this rapid increase are felt around the globe. Starvation, deforestation and lack of clean water are just some of the problems".
4. Finally, on issue of racism, we just have to toughen up a bit and accept that it will happen, and that if we're going to win, we can't run away from this issue just because people will call us names. There are people out there who will look you in the eye and put their hand on their heart and swear black and blue that they are progressives, that they are left of centre, but they will not touch population because they are scared of being called names.
This is very ironic, given that the most common characteristic I find in the people who I have come across in my work on the population issue is compassion.Many of you are motivated by compassion for the environment, by compassion for other living creatures. You do not think it is alright to trample species after species into extinction on our relentless growth path. Others are motivated by compassion for the poor of the world, and feel deeply about the plight of the poor and the great disparity of wealth between globally rich and poor. You see population growth as the great obstacle to lifting the poor out of poverty.
It is ironic in the extreme, therefore, that we have a couple of agents provocateur out there accusing us of trying to hijack the environmental movement, when we are the most fair dinkum environmentalists you'll find. I defy anyone to challenge the environmental credentials of Jacques Cousteau, who has devoted his entire life to marine conservation.
Cousteau said. "We must alert and organize the world's people to pressure world leaders to take specific steps to solve the two root causes of our environmental crises - exploding population growth and wasteful consumption of irreplaceable resources”. He says “Over consumption and overpopulation underlie every environmental problem we face today".
I defy anyone to challenge the environmental credentials of Captain Paul Watson, the Founder of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, who has spent his life risking injury and imprisonment to harass Japanese whalers.
He says quote “the accusation that a stand to reduce immigration is racist is music to the ears to those who profit from the cheap labour of immigrants. They are the same people who love to see environmentalists make fools of themselves. And there is no environmentalist more foolish than one who refuses to confront the fact that uncontrolled human population growth is the number one cause of the world's increasing environmental problems”.
And does anyone think Sir David Attenborough, with a lifetime behind him of educating and advocating for the protection of our rainforests and other wilderness areas, a bogus environmentalist? David Attenborough has described global population increase as frightening, and said the following. “I've seen wildlife under mounting human pressure all over the world and it's not just from human economy or technology - behind every threat is the frightening explosion in human numbers. ". He said " I've never seen a problem that wouldn't be easier to solve with fewer people, or harder, and ultimately impossible, with more".
Well I am not scared of being called names. I don't enjoy it, but I dislike a whole lot more the fact that instead of the optimistic view I had of political progress when I was young, that we were getting better at looking after the environment and had learned from our mistakes, that we were going to stamp out global hunger and poverty, that we would stop going to war, that in fact we are going backwards. On the Environment, war, waste, terrorism, global poverty, extreme weather etc.
And I dislike more the fact that this has happened during my political career and that I have been quite unable to stop it. Being an MP is a great opportunity and privilege, and with my remaining time as an MP I want to do everything I can to turn this around.
I want to put forward an alternative, a smart alternative, to the direction we are going now, which I absolutely believe is the wrong direction. At the heart of this smart alternative is the idea of stewardship. I got the word from my sister Jaquie. She is a strong Christian, whereas I don't have any religious beliefs. But you will have heard the phrase, we don't inherit the earth from our parents, we borrow it from our children, and I think that it is spot on. We don't own the place, we have the privilege of managing it for a while. And I have regularly finished speeches by saying that we have an obligation to hand down to our children and grandchildren a world in as good a condition as the one our parents and grandparents left to us.
I think stewardship is a good word to express this fundamentally crucial idea. I've decided I like it better than sustainability.
You could fill libraries with the work done on sustainability, and properly understood it is indeed a powerful and useful idea, but sadly it has been so used and abused and prostituted, including by the forces of darkness, that it has become an Alice in Wonderland word - you know, when I use a word it means whatever I choose it to mean, so nowadays pretty meaningless. So when you hear the word sustainability in future, substitute for it the word stewardship - I find it works pretty well.
The second thing about my smart alternative is that it is very mainstream or middle of the road. I believe in giving the voters what they want. People who believe in giving the voters what they want are, again, at risk of being called names - for example, populist. But the people who scream populist are essentially trying to fool us into supporting ideas that are not in our own best interests. The people who scream populist reveal a basic contempt for the people and their ideas, and a lack of respect for democracy. Again, if we are going to succeed, we have to be strong enough to put up with a bit of name calling. Because population is not about race, it is about stewardship.
Some people will think my ideas radical, because they are very different from the path we are on at the moment. Some will think them conservative, because they place a lot of value on our heritage and value the past and are sceptical about the changes that are happening in our world. Indeed I often think my ideas are more conservative than the Liberal Party, better for workers than is the Labor Party, and better for the environment than are the Greens. But at their heart is giving the voters what they want, not what some billionaire or their media puppets think is good for them.
And another element of my ideas, again consistent with giving people a genuine say, is making things as small, and local, and self-sufficient, as we can be. Globalization has helped a lot of people, but it's also harmed plenty, and in the world of the future we will be better off retaining as much independence and self-reliance and self-sufficiency as we can.
And given that, and because we have to start somewhere, I want to focus on Victoria First. Victoria has a greater population increase each year that any other state or territory, driven by having the largest migration intake.
What on earth is the value of this?
We are told the big increase in Australia's migrant worker programs is to meet the needs of the mining boom, and to find workers for remote and inhospitable parts of Australia that locals won't live in. That's the myth.
The reality is that more people come to Victoria than anywhere else, and that Victoria ends up with all the problems associated with this rapid population growth - Melbourne grows by 200 per day, 1500 per week, 75000 per annum. In my view Melbourne and Victoria is the archetypal example of the folly of rapid population growth, and for me as Melbourne and Victorian born and bred, it is exactly the place to start a fight back and push back against this foolishness and short-sightedness.
So what is Victoria First going to do? There are many things we could do, but first and foremost we have to grow. You probably know that exponential growth is behind the population problems the world has. But I want us to make exponential growth work for us.
How will we grow?
Of course any and all suggestions to do this are welcome. I need and value your assistance in this mighty enterprise. But my ideas are as follows. First, enjoy the summer. I love the Australian way of life. The warm summer nights, the caravan parks by the beach ( not sand overshadowed by high rise) the cricket on TV. I want to save that, not spoil it. So have a rest and enjoy the summer. But I do want you to do three things over the summer.
First, join. It costs $10. But this is not about money. It's about your time and your energy and your various abilities. If you don't join today, please take a membership form and join later.
Second, take one or more of the takeaways, speeches etc. on the table and read them one day when you're sunning yourself somewhere.
And third, when you have those family or office or neighbourhood get togethers, or you're down the beach or up on the Murray River talking to someone in the tent next to you, get them gently, GENTLY - don't ram it down their throats, no-one likes being lectured - onto the topic of population and stewardship. And somewhere, in your family, or your workplace, or your street, or your holiday spot, find someone else who will join up.
If you all join up, and the people who are apologies who've told me they'll join up join up, we'll start with over 100. But by February 1st next year, let's make it 200. If everyone here finds one other person in the next two months, we'll have that.
And with 200 people we can letterbox a Federal electorate. Now it's up to me to find the money and get the leaflets printed - all help gratefully received! But it's up to me to accomplish that. And of course not everyone can letterbox, but I'm hoping that in your elaborate network and complicated circle of obligations and favours given and received that you can find someone to do that for you.
And if we can do this every month or couple of months next year we could build up to 1000 by the end of the year. They might prove to be very easy, or it might prove too ambitious, but it is a target, a goal.
And then the year after that, we will use our 1000 members to build up to 10000. Because then we will be taken seriously. We could have a rally now, but we will be ignored, almost certainly by media and certainly by governments. And even with a membership of 1000, in a state of several million we will still be ignored and overlooked. But if we have 10,000, and can turn out half of them to a rally outside Parliament House or the Melbourne Town Hall or the Property Council - then they will listen to us.
Of course we can support and be involved in campaigns which reinforce our message. A few meters from here they want to build a freeway through Royal Park and over what's left of the Moonee Ponds Creek.
It's a disgrace. Let's fight that. And my Council, Moreland, has released draft Planning Zones, or daft Planning Zones, that would enable high rise to move right through beautiful single story detached dwelling suburbs like Brunswick West, Pascoe Vale and Oak Park. Let's fight that.
And I'm up for innovative ideas on spreading the message. Use social media, of course. And taking our leaflets and membership application forms to places where people are feeling the sharp end of population growth - CBD car parks for motorists who've been stuck in traffic jams, Council meetings and VCAT hearings where residents are being done over by developers, universities, where students are facing ferocious competition in the job market, maybe auctions where young people are missing out on a home of their own, senior citizens clubs where older people struggle to pay the bills for our infrastructure expansion.
We need to find the people who are suffering from rapid population growth, support them, and recruit them.
CONCLUSION Edward Kennedy's speeches were undoubtedly some of the finest of the twentieth century, and everyone knows two passages from his speech about his second assassinated brother Robert, - ' my brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, but be remembered as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. And secondly, "some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were, and say why not?
But before he said those things in this most memorable of speeches he said the following.
"Few are willing to brave the disapproval of their fellows, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential, vital quality for those who seek to change a world that yields most painfully to change. And I believe that in this generation those with the courage to enter the moral conflict will find themselves with companions in every corner of the globe".
I believe that as well. My fellow Victorians, it is time we went out and found ourselves some companions in this little corner of the globe.
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council (AWPC) is gravely concerned by the ‘use and commercialisation of Australian native animals’, their extinction rates, cruelty inflicted on them, and recreational hunting. Even more so, given that Australia has the world’s highest extinction rate. Instead of apologising for crimes against nature, the Victorian State Government seeks to extend further exploitation.
(Candobetter Ed. Some headings in this submission have been changed for clarity of presentation.)
SUBMISSION From
Australian Wildlife Protection Council (AWPC)
Kindness House
288 Brunswick Street
Fitzroy
Victoria 3065
To
Environment Policy Division
Department of Sustainability and Environment
PO Box 500 East Melbourne VIC 3002
With reference to
3 May 2013
The Australian Wildlife Protection Council appreciates the opportunity to provide a submission.
We are gravely concerned by the ‘use and commercialisation of Australian native animals’, their extinction rates, cruelty inflicted on them, recreational hunting. Even more so, given that Australia has the world’s highest extinction rate.
Instead of apologising for crimes against nature, Government seeks to extend further exploitation.
Australian Wildlife Protection Council (AWPC) was founded in 1969.
Our members are dedicated to the preservation of Australia’s native animals, their protection from exploitation, and any other cruelty to which they are routinely subjected, so that they can live safe in their native habitat across their natural ranges.
We seek their freedom from lethal controls, agricultural toxins, herbicides, pesticides, and poisons like 1080, fenthion, fenitrothion. We believe that wildlife needs to be protected and conserved in their natural ecological habitats.
We seek a change in attitudes, especially when they are needlessly killed, poisoned, commercialised and otherwise persecuted.
We aim to promote the intrinsic qualities of kangaroos and Australia's wildlife heritage so that viable populations are seen as desirable and valuable.
We aim to promote the viewing of large mobs of kangaroos as a first class wildlife experience and support the development and marketing of wildlife-based tourism.
The letter below totally encapsulates the opinion of AWPC, we are repulsed by the subaltern attitude with which DSE and this Government treat the citizens of this state.
The Age, April 27/28/2013 Joan Reilly, Surrey Hills
“The state government is reviewing the wildlife regulations but, although the consultation concludes in less than a week, readers of “The Age” are unlikely to have heard of it. The relevant notices were placed only in the Murdoch tabloid and the Government Gazette, some three weeks ago”.
Members of the public and animal welfare groups and animals themselves are omitted from the list of stakeholders affected by the proposals. Anyone concerned to find out about new rules for those who trap, keep, breed, trade, kill or process wildlife will need to peruse some 200 pages of proposals and also refer back to about 80 pages of existing regulations to understand what will change”.
“The focus is on economic benefit to businesses and reduced public sector workload.
The arrogance of this regulation by stealth is breathtaking”.
“There is a strong and growing interest in the Victorian community to keep wildlife as pets”.
While some smaller native animals such as reptiles, fish and birds can be housed and cared for appropriately as pets, we do not endorse opening up more wildlife species for commercial sales.
“Without the regulations in place, there would be no authorising mechanism to allow legal trade, possession and use of wildlife in Victoria”.
We appreciate that wildlife parks will breed native animals to keep their populations relevant and viable.
However, “there is also a demand for the farming of some species of wildlife, the processing of wildlife products, the control of wildlife causing problems to people through disturbance or damage to property and the private possession of mounted wildlife”.
Kangaroos, in particular, cannot be farmed; kangaroos cannot be yarded, herded or transported as are domestic livestock. AWPC vigorously opposes “farming” of wildlife, the use of their body parts as such practices ignore the most basic behavioural and dietary needs of this living behaving biological entity. “Control” of wildlife is already out of control.
“DSE estimates that the annual expenditure on wildlife by private and commercial licence holders is in the order of $63.7 million per annum”.
There's a very malicious and anthropocentric attitude that wildlife are obliged to satisfy some usefulness to humans, to contribute to pleasure, entertainment or commercial profits, and conversely, wildlife can be eliminated if they cause any “problems”, “disturbance” or “damage” to property or profits of landholders. Wildlife should remain wild, and should not have to justify their existence in monetary terms. The harvest of native animals from their native habitat is prohibited under the Wildlife Act 1975. This should remain the case and legislation regarding wildlife should be primarily for conservation, protection, and education.
“New regulatory proposals, including the remaking of expired regulations that impose a significant economic or social burden on a sector of the public, require the preparation of a Regulatory Impact Statement (RIS)”.
The “economic” and “social burden” is green tape designed to protect wildlife. Wildlife issues must be addressed holistically, and landholders need to be given expert advice on land use and wildlife deterrents to avoid conflicts. The efficiency and effectiveness of regulations should endorse their original aims and objectives, not increase human gain and economic benefits. Tragically, many unique animals are found nowhere else but south-eastern Australia, Victoria. Yet, they are being pushed to the brink of extinction by habitat loss, introduced species, infectious diseases, fire, urban sprawl and climate change. Clearly, the excessive numbers of human activities means that present legislation and policies to protect wildlife in Victoria are not working, and species are being lost. The Wildlife Act 1975 needs to be upgraded to create better guarantees for species protection, more native habitat for their long-term survival, and interconnecting bio-links (wildlife corridors) to save species.
"The purposes of the Wildlife Act 1975 (Vic) are:
to establish procedures in order to promote -
the protection and conservation of wildlife; and
the prevention of taxa of wildlife from becoming extinct; and
the sustainable use of and access to wildlife; and
to prohibit and regulate the conduct of persons engaged in activities concerning or related to wildlife."
AWPC does not support any “use” of wildlife except for educational and conservation purposes. The original aim of the Wildlife Act 1975 must be strengthened, to provide greater protection of habitat, elimination and/or control of introduced species, fire, urban sprawl and climate change. Australia’s unique wildlife lived safely in near-pristine environments for millions of years, but European settlement has taken a catastrophic toll on their long-term survival. Exemptions for landholders, those with vested interests to utilise wildlife, would create more deaths, increase illegal trade and commercial profits.
The proposed regulations incorporate some new provisions and changes, including streamlining some licence categories, resetting fees, adding a number of new species that may be kept and introducing multi-year licences.
We object to “adding a number of new species” that may be kept by the public. Native birds live in flocks. Isolating them in cages is a tragic existence.
It is ethically wrong to keep pet birds in tiny cages where flying is inhibited. Native parrots and cockatoos should not be confined in cages but only in aviaries with sufficient height, depth and width for flight and social interaction with other birds. Cockatoos are large birds and have large requirements. They are not suitable as backyard pets in cages. The numbers in cages need to be limited according to space. (experts must specify according to size, breed and behaviours). They need to be only kept in very large aviaries, in wildlife parks or in regional areas with carers experienced in the care of native parrots and cockatoos - and their special needs.
Native mammals need habitat and specialised food sources to live ethically and naturally. There are already a large variety of domestic pet species of animals available; pet rescue centres struggle to provide services to keep up with demand. We have “death row” for unwanted and homeless cats and dogs, puppy factories that churn out puppies to an already over-saturated market. Cruelty, neglect, over-breeding, abandonment are the flip-side of our so-called pet-friendly society.
It is immoral and unethical to add native animals to these shocking statistics.
Wildlife controller licences are to be categorised into 2 types.
AWPC is already concerned by the liberal and excessive way DSE hand out licences to “control” wildlife with Authority To Control Wildlife (ATCW) permits, without first obtaining expert advice on alternatives to killing, or even checking to see if there is justification that such “control” is valid.
Two categories for “controlling” wildlife is odious, undesirable and totally unnecessary. Instead there needs to be more DSE wildlife officers on the road, visiting farmers and landholders, and making sure that lethal “control” is the LAST RESORT not the first option.
The ATCW permit system is only a quasi set of rules and regulations and is in desperate need of total law reform as evidenced in our letter to Greg Wilson, Secretary DSE dated 26 August 2012.
AWPC is extremely concerned about this licence, the “processing” of wildlife for commercial benefits is something that the AWPC strongly opposes and we believe this licence is a thinly veiled attempt to usher into Victoria a commercial Kangaroo industry.
We are very aware of the changes the Victorian Government has made to the Ministerial control of the Wildlife Act the majority of which is under the control of Peter Walsh Minister for Agriculture and Food Safety which begs the question; what connection is there between wildlife and agriculture? Apart from the frequent issuing of ATCW’s It has been proven on many occasions that a commercial kangaroo industry in Victoria isn’t ecologically sustainable. (CSIRO 1982)
The DSE issues thousands of permits to cull kangaroos in Victoria each year - with the aim of controlling wild populations. Carcasses are often left to rot on the ground after a cull creating potential disease risks while providing a food source for feral animals and in turn, encouraging the growth of fox populations.
The practice of leaving Kangaroo carcasses on the ground has germinated the idea that these carcasses should be available for commercial use, hence the need for a ‘processor’s licence’
The commercial use of Kangaroo carcasses shot under and ATCW permit is insanity because of the logistics of collection, hygiene and knowledge of where and when Kangaroo culling will occur.
The issuing of a processors license for this reason, no matter how illogical or unsustainable it may be does however serve a purpose and AWPC believes this purpose is the subterfuge introduction of a commercial Kangaroo industry into Victoria once processor licenses are available.
A new category of wildlife licence, the Dingo Licence, has been introduced for those wishing to keep dingoes. This will incur a fee similar to a Wildlife Advanced Licence.
We note that some native rats, cockatoos and parrots have been added to the list of species:
Schedule 4A means that there's no licence for commercial trade or possession. There will be little regulation for this species and they will be sold at market. They will end up similar to gold fish or canaries, with no guarantee for their welfare or specialised social, spatial and environmental needs.
“Wildlife enthusiasts will benefit from continued recreational wildlife ownership opportunities and businesses that possess, trade or use wildlife will benefit from a well- managed, legal and robust industry”.
The AWPC opposes industrialisation or the commercialisation of wildlife. The idea of a “robust” industry is contrary to the aim of conservation and animal welfare policies of the AWPC. We do not want or support the economic growth of “industries” associated with wildlife, unless they support their holistic conservation and education of the public.
“Monitoring of licence holders will be carried out through targeted and random inspections of premises and record books by DSE Wildlife Compliance Officers or in response to suspected illegal activity or non-compliance with the requirement to submit annual returns”.
If there are enough Victorian government personal resources for these random inspections, they should include random inspections of property owners before they are able to lethally “control” (kill) wildlife.
Wildlife Farmer Licence
The AWPC do not approve of “farms” of wildlife. Emu farms means that emus become another exotic “meat” source and end up bred in captivity, contrary to our policies. Emus belong to the oldest living family of birds on earth, the rarities or flightless fowl. They are nomads, designed by 90 million years of evolution to roam over vast tracks of land.
Subjecting emus with their long thin necks and legs, and large fragile eyes, to transport is cruel and inhumane. Slaughter bound birds and mammals are typically starved for hours, even days before they are killed. Hauled in all kinds of weather, they are forced to endure truck vibrations, heat, stress, cold, damp, thirst and terror. They are then shot with a captive bolt, like cattle or, like poultry, electrically shocked (not stunned) and then hung upside down to have their throats cut, being kept alive when their blood drains. They are slaughtered at 12-15 months of age. This is degrading, and trivialising these unique birds. Adding any “game” birds to this farming category is unconscionable and unethical.
Game Bird Farmer Licence
“Allows the holder to farm game birds that have been bred in captivity for the purpose of releasing them on a specified premise for hunting (from Part A of Schedule 5 and specified in the licence)”.
We do not believe in the recreation of hunting wildlife. Breeding in captivity for hunting is akin to canned hunting, and is something which is abhorrent to wildlife activists and lovers.
“Wildlife Controller Licence Allows the holder to take wildlife from the wild and to destroy, dispose of or sell that wildlife for the purpose of removing danger to persons or property from that wildlife (from Schedule 6, and specified in the licence)”.
Examples of species that may be controlled under this licence are venomous snakes, deer, Common Brushtail Possums and Sulphur-crested Cockatoos”.
Deer are NOT Australian wildlife. Common Brushtail Possums and Sulphur-crested Cockatoo never endanger human lives, and there are non-lethal methods of deterring their impacts.
Possums are native wildlife. All native wildlife is protected under the Wildlife Act 1975. There are non-lethal ways of dealing with possums, such as relocation and trees and gardens around our houses provide modified woodland similar to their natural habitat. People and possums can live together successfully.
There are companies that supply engineering controls for cockatoos, including ultrasonic devices, kites and other visual deterrents, low voltage shock tape, birdspikes and noise deterrents.
AWPC advises that should consideration be given to the introduction of a commercial Kangaroo industry into Victoria, the following must be carefully read and understood before any final decisions are made.
“The ban on commercial processing of culled kangaroos in Victoria must be lifted, the Competition and Efficiency Commission has told the State Government. A draft commission report said the ban appeared ‘unnecessarily burdensome’. The Weekly Times asked Victorian Environment Minister Ryan Smith for comment on the issue, but was referred instead to the office of Treasurer Kim Wells... The commission also called on the Government to simplify the process for obtaining permits, estimating the cost of issuing each Authority to Control Wildlife Permit (ATCW) was about $480... ‘Taking into account the need for a site visit and the rigor of the permit system...yields an administrative cost of approximately $480, or $863,000 across industry”, the VCEC report said.
Victoria is the only mainland state to prohibit commercial processing of its kangaroos...” Source: Peter Hunt, 'Processing Ban ROO-Turn, Hop to it', Weekly Times, April 6, 2011.
Relative to the above Weekly times article, AWPC Submits:
"The density of grey kangaroos in western Victoria and south-eastern South Australia is only 15% of that recorded for the pastoral zone of New South Wales. Such low densities reflect the effect of intensive land use and the marginal nature for kangaroos in remaining areas of natural vegetation.” With exponential human population growth and devastation of a prolonged drought, a commercial kangaroo ‘harvest’ for Victoria would be economically unviable/ unsustainable. Kangaroos are facing more threats than ever today, with the 13 year long drought, tragic bushfires, loss of gene pool, urban expansion, floods, disease and climate change factors. Why push them further into ‘extinction’ mode, and threaten their survival even further? This is what commercial profits for kangaroo meat will do.
Kangaroo meat was classified as Game Meat in 1989 by a Game Meat Working Party, established by the Federal Government. The decision to remove kangaroos from the protected List and change their status to Game Meat was made because: (a) Kangaroo meat could not meet domestic health standards and (b) No animal welfare or conservation groups were present
Fevered Meat
Ramifications of fevered meat entering the food chain is explained by Dr John Auty, Historian, Veterinarian and former Federal Bureau of Animal Health, Canberra, ACT.
“Meat hygiene standards require for all classes of animals that any condition that can cause elevation of body temperature has the potential to cause the condition known as ‘fevered’ meat. Such meat is unsuitable for human consumption.
A condition causing blindness in kangaroos, stress, inability to eat or to find water, elevation of body temperature etc. should result in condemnation of the meat from such diseased animals. It is immaterial if this condition causes generalised septicaemia or not”.
“Kangaroo shooters are not competent to judge disease in animals ante mortem unless the disease is well advanced and it is not in their economic interests to reject animals (kangaroos)”.
“The Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service (AQIS) inspectors inspect kangaroos only after they are transferred to coastal BONING establishments i.e. after they have been eviscerated in the field. Such meat hygiene standards are not acceptable for domestic animals”.
“Whereas the diseases that affect domestic animals are well understood and form the basis for modern meat hygiene, the diseases affecting kangaroos are virtually unknown and there are virtually no Veterinarians based in the areas in which kangaroos are shot”.
How Clean is the Kill?
“Kangaroos are wild animals shot in the outback and they lay on the ground with the flies, airborne bacteria, faeces of other animals and other contaminants. Some of the diseases associated with kangaroo meat are:
*Salmonellae *Coxiella *Sarcocysts *Nematodes *Fasciolia Hepatic Flukes *Subcutaneous and Musculature Cysts *Hydatid Cysts Kangaroos carry internal and external parasites and a range of diseases
Background
The outbreak of a blindness disease infection (Choroid Blindness) which spread across four states in the years ’94, ’95, ’96 caused the death of an estimated one million kangaroos and represented a serious ecological problem to kangaroo populations. Government attempted to keep the issue out of the public arena and displayed ineptitude and an appalling lack of responsibility.
Blind kangaroos were killed or died after jumping in front of traffic, drowning after falling into flowing rivers or starving because they could not find pasture. Source: AWPC 1999. ‘Diseases in Kangaroo Meat’ in The Kangaroo BETRAYED, Hill of Content Melbourne, pp 31-33)
Kangaroos and wallabies can harbour a wide range of parasitic, bacterial, fungal and viral diseases and the majority of infections are unapparent (i.e. animals appear normal). Even meat inspection procedures are unlikely to detect some infections unless gross lesions are detected or routine samples are taken for microbiological and pathological testing.
Worldwide, it is recognised that so-called ‘game meats’ are a source of these infections for hunters, processors and consumers, especially when care is not taken while eviscerating and handling the carcasses or when the meat from these animals is served undercooked or raw. Trichinosis, cysticercosis and toxoplasmosis are examples of parasitic zoonoses (i.e. diseases transmissible from animals to humans).
In Australia, Toxoplasmosis and the bacterial disease, Salmonellosis are two infections with public health significance directly related to the handling, processing and consumption of kangaroo meat. The October issue of Woman’s’ Day (1995) reported that a food-borne outbreak of toxoplasmosis caused acute clinical illnesses in 12 humans and one case of congenital chorio-retinitis (inflammation of the eye tissues) in a new born baby. The mother of the affected baby together with the 12 other people had attended a Christmas function at which rare kangaroo medallions were served. A thorough epidemiological investigation concluded that the most likely ‘risk food’ was the kangaroo meat.
Even ‘new’ human diseases have been shown to have origins in Australian game meat. In 1993 the first confirmed human case of Pseudotrichinosis was diagnosed. The medical investigators concluded that the patient became infected in Tasmania through eating meat, most probably derived from a wild animal. Subsequent research conducted at the University of Tasmania showed that about 2% of Tasmanians surveyed had antibodies to this muscle-encysting nematode.
Professor John Goldsmid, Lecturer in Microbiology at the University of Tasmania expressed his scientific concerns about the lack of research into a range of diseases and parasites transmissible between Tasmanian native animals and humans.
Australia has no dedicated research or diagnostic facility to investigate wildlife diseases. Detections of new diseases are handled on an ad hoc basis by government or university laboratories.
Possums trapped overnight in wire cages (comparable to that described in the brush possum code) show that cage distress and attempts to escape causes muscle damage comparable to capture-stress myopathy of deer. Tasmania is the only State of Australia listed by the WHO as having endemic trichinosis in its wildlife. The Tasmanian Department responsible for permitting a game meat industry denied there was a public health risk associated with the harvesting and processing of Tasmanian possum. Tasmanian wildlife harbour parasitic diseases which are serious infections in humans.
A recent scientific report of the International Health Organisation, the Office Internationale des Epizootes warns that wild animal meats which are raw, undercooked, dried or cold-smoked are potentially infectious to animal or humans that consume them.
The incidence of Toxoplasma abortions and infertility is amongst the highest in Australia. Free ranging wallabies, pademelons, bandicoots and wombats are regularly killed by this infection and surveys show a high percentage of wallabies harbour this infection.
The concern is that chefs and food raconteurs recommend cooking methods which would not kill this parasite.
A newly identified worm thought to be derived from marsupials was found to be responsible for acute illness in two humans. Like Trichinella they invade muscles. The worms are thought to belong to a class of nematodes known as Muscpiceoids. In wallabies and possums these nematodes live in several tissues of the body and can invade muscles.
In his paper to the University of Tasmania (1997 114 ), Professor John Goldsmid said, "Kliks (1983) identified the aetiological agents of human infectious diseases as "heirloom" or "souvenir" species, depending on their evolutionary association with humans. Amongst the most important of the souvenir species are the zoonotic infections, infecting humans as a result of animal-human contact of some kind and varying from companionable contact to utilisation of animals as a food source.
In the last 25 or so years, of 35 new or newly recognised infections in humans, 20 (57%) have been zoonotic in origin - some trivial, some devastating to both the individual and the community.
With the increase in the numbers of immunocompromised people in the community resulting from medical treatment or as a result of the spread of AIDS, the problem of zoonotic infections will continue and there seems little doubt that the likely source for many of these new human infections in Australia will be the native animal population.
People who eat undercooked wallaby or kangaroo meat could be at risk of infection by a newly-discovered animal parasite, Australian doctors have warned. The parasite was found in a Tasmanian man who suffered from inexplicable and severe muscle weakness over a number of years. He was known to consume large quantities of game. ("Parasite Risk to Game Eaters" November 7, 1997 Animal Pharmacology No. 384)
Laboratory tests suggests that the parasite is a new species of microscopic worm. It may also have been responsible for a similar infection in a New Zealand woman who had eaten wallaby meat while visiting Tasmania.
"The cases highlight the risks of eating wild game, the parasites of which are poorly understood compared with those of livestock. More studies are needed to identify disease agents in these animals and to elucidate the role of native animal species in the transmission of diseases to humans."
Victoria has no fauna management framework;
Victoria has no scientific kangaroo population data. Given there is no population data, commercial utilization is economically unviable and unsustainable for survival of kangaroos.
DSE data base fails threatened species
Roads are a Threatening process
Genetic variability / Wildlife Corridors and to re-connect bio-links to save species
Human induced threats and self-limiting factors control kangaroo populations
Climate change/ population growth driving species to extinction Climate change/ population growth driving species to extinction
DSE has a Duty of Care -Kangaroos are not a Commodity to be bartered and sold
We know that overwhelmingly, it is mostly ‘hobby farmers’ who seek ATCW permits. We seek Regulations for ATCW permits to be issued only to landowners whose sole income is from legitimate farming, as opposed to ‘hobby’ farmers for tax deductibility write offs.
Left just with the sole income farmers, this becomes an area that needs education/ awareness of productive farming in harmony with biodiversity and ecosystems; Learn to live with wildlife.
This is the only way to stop the ethically, morally and humanely deficient and farcical practice of DSE issuing ATCW kill kangaroo Permits in Victoria.
Prove that the ATCW permits DSE gives away like candy are legitimate, with tight conditions
This is particularly pertinent to wildlife carers who already suffer from ATCW permits given to adjoining landowners placing at risk the very kangaroos they have a license to hand rear.
Under the current system it costs Victorian tax payers for landowners to kill protected kangaroos without their say or consent; (yet taxpayers have to pay hefty $$$ for FOI)
Why then is this cost not passed onto the landowner if they are benefitting from it?
DSE data base fails kangaroos and threatened species
In Victoria 2006, Exec Director Dr Ian Miles arranged for Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) Adrian Moorrees, Project Manager, Actions for Biodiversity Conservation (ABC), Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Division to demonstrate to AWPC, the DSE Actions Biodiversity Conservation (ABC) Data Base system. We discovered that “DSE uses an inadequate Victoria-wide definition of ‘threatened’ which means that local populations can be extinguished without sounding the alarm so long as some numbers remain for the whole state ; pockets where animals appear numerous, due to fragmented populations trapped in small areas, are not assigned official ‘threatened’ status. Little effective tab is kept of numbers. More and more native species simply vanish, Sheila Newman, Environmental and Land Use Planning Sociologist for the Australian Wildlife Protection Council.
In Hamilton the west of the state, will argue that every other state has Environment Australia-approved management plans to harvest kangaroos for export. But in Victoria kangaroos are culled only for damage control. Annually, 9000-30,000 animals are authorised to be destroyed. The council will argue there is a potential commercial use for these kangaroo products, but current regulations did not allow culled kangaroos to be moved from where they died.
Ms Wolf-Tasker said it was "wonderful to see a council being pro-active on this''. "We've used kangaroo meat here for a decade but because of Victoria's rule we have to buy it from South Australia, despite kangaroos being culled here,'' she said. "Kangaroo is a great, healthy product. "It is has a more gamey flavour and is one of the last wild foods. "It is wonderful to use it with locally-grown indigenous plants from this area, such as the mountain pepper.'' Ms Wolf-Tasker said consumers increasingly wanted to know where their meat came from and kangaroo was a very popular, "natural, wild food''.
Despite concerns raised by some animal rights groups over using kangaroo meat for human consumption, Ms Wolf-Tasker said if the "necessary culling was properly regulated, using the meat for human consumption could prevent the waste of what is a very good product''. She said kangaroos needed to be culled when in plague proportions because they "caused havoc on farms and in the local environment''. A spokeswoman for Environment Minister Ryan Smith said yesterday the State Government was evaluating the feasibility of commercial harvesting of wild kangaroos with advice from the Department of Primary Industries. "We will await the outcome of that work before making decision about possible changes to regulation to allow commercial kangaroo harvesting,'' she said.
http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/article/2012/09/12/536971_business-news.html
THINKK, the think tank for kangaroos, based at the University of Technology Sydney and supported by Voiceless, released two reports late last year examining the killing of kangaroos in Australia. Each year over three million kangaroos are ‘harvested’ and over a million joeys are killed as part of the commercial industry. This is the largest land-based slaughter of wildlife in the world.
The reports, titled “Advocating kangaroo meat: towards ecological benefit or plunder?” and “Shooting our wildlife: An analysis of the law and policy governing the killing of kangaroos”, conclude that:
emerging science indicates that kangaroos are not pests;
over 20 years of harvesting kangaroos has had no demonstrable environmental benefit;
increased consumption of kangaroo meat by humans is likely to place kangaroo populations at risk;
State governments once treated kangaroos as agricultural pests yet today they are treated as a resource;
The current law is a form of legalised cruelty.
Please download the reports by following this link. http://www.voiceless.org.au/About_Us/Misc/THINKK_the_think_tank_for_kangaroos.html
For additional information about THINKK, please visit their website at http://thinkkangaroos.uts.edu.au.
“In any wild animal if you disrupt in a short period of time the normal reproduction processes that have evolved over tens of thousands of years you are in danger of putting the species at risk. Precedents have been set in other parts of the world where large populations of a species ( seals. Bison, wolves etc) have faced extinction after widespread and destructive ‘culling’ programs. Many of these species suffered incursion of exotic bacterias and viruses when their populations contained a critical and unsustainable gene pool.
To be able to undertake the largest wildlife slaughter in the world today it was necessary to undertake a long and sustained program of misinformation within Australia to convince the community that these animals are in plague proportions throughout the country areas of Australia. This was achieved by presenting he animal as a “resource” that needed to be exploited. A program of ‘shoot and let lie’ would have avoided the introduction of commercial pressures (COOMA, ACT and surrounds + MUDGEE and surrounds) on the wild animals and forced the introduction of the less destructive commercial ‘alternative’.
Where farmers and pastoralists (with sheep, cattle and crops) are in competition with any native animal, the government administrators always favour the land owner. Whatever native animal is involved, that animal is marked for destruction.
There are many examples of this entrenched ‘destructive culture’, now being undertaken in South Australia.” Source: Chapter ‘From Conservation to Exploitation in South Australia’ by Doug Reilly Macropod expert in the AWPC 1999 publication, The Kangaroo BetrayedHill of Content, Melbourne, p.37.
Respectfully Submitted,
Maryland Wilson President
Vivienne Ortega Vice President
Cienwen Hickey Research
Sheila Newman Environmental Sociologist Land Use Planner
Tony Burke had no legal obligation to even consider the threatened koalas in Leard forest for the Maules Creek and Boggabri approval. New loopholes could see developers and miners determining if koalas are under threat.
Federal documents obtained by the ABC unveiled on 13 February that the Federal government is endeavouring to make it even easier for miners and developers to avoid protecting koalas.
This comes as Federal Minister Tony Burke approves the Maules Creek and Boggabri open cut coal mines in Leard forest, despite never considering the impacts to koalas.
"The thousands of hectares of Leard State forest to be destroyed by the open cut coal mines are teeming with koalas, however they are offered absolutely no protection by the 2012 addition of the koala to the federal threatened species list," said Naomi Hogan of The Wilderness Society.
Tony Burke had no legal obligation to even consider the hundreds of Koalas that will certainly die as a result of the Boggabri and Maules Creek open cut coal mines in Leard forest. The Maules Creek and Boggabri open coal mining applications were lodged before the koala became a federally listed threatened species, so the Federal government isn't obliged to even consider the koala's plight. The koalas in Leard forest now face a slash and burn future. In essence, the federal koala protection law is useless to the koalas facing a forest wipe out by the Maules Creek and Boggabri open cut approvals."
This date discrepancy is just one of many loopholes in our Federal environmental protection law.
On 13 February it was revealed by the ABC that under the leaked draft federal guidelines, the applicant seeking to develop an area must establish for themselves if an area has koalas and if their proposed activity will have an impact on the habitat. The guidelines to not include any koala maps nor a requirement for long term koala surveys.
"No developer, no mining company can be trusted to undertake their own assessments of threatened species. Mining companies are driven by their legal requirement to make money, not to protect our threatened koalas. I have no doubt that many mining companies would rather see koalas dead than have them interrupting with their profits," said Ms Hogan.
Media Release 13 February 2013 from The Wilderness Society
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