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I feel compelled to enter the debate on cannon
netting, to redress some factual errors. Yes, fatalities do occur, but in
the hands of an experienced team, nothing like 4%. I can count on one hand
the number of times I have seen a bird decapitated. Decapitation is
generally a sign that the bird was too close to the net at the time of firing,
and extreme caution is taken to ensure that this does not happen. >From my
experience, the great majority of fatalities result from two causes: capture
myopathy and drowning. The Queensland Wader Study Group (QWSG) has taken
measures to minimise both causes of death, and it is very rare for us to have a
single fatality. Certain species are more prone to capture myopathy, such
as Bar-tailed Godwit and Great Knot, and we wont fire a net if a flock is
too large. Mesh size has been altered to minimise tangling
of feathers, and thus reduce stress. At the first sign of capture
myopathy, birds are just released. Handling is kept to a minimum.
Only in exceptional circumstances will a net be fired into water, and then only
if the team is large and experienced.
I think you just have to open a copy of The
Stilt to see some of the benefits of the work. The leg-flagging
program has been extremely successful. For example, from leg-flag
sightings, a large body of data has been collected in the last couple of years
showing the link between breeding Bar-tailed Godwits in Alaska and wintering
birds in Australia.
I think some of Tom Tarrant's veiled criticisms of
the wader study groups are unwarranted (who else could he be speaking
about? No one else in Australia has a permit to cannon net waders).
The QWSG has not cannon netted for a couple of years, and is not likely to do so
in the forseeable future. However, the group has remained extremely
active, doing such "boring" activities as running a monthly count program,
lobbying to save roost sites such as those at Manly and Dux Creek, doing
comprehensive surveys of the Great Sandy Straits (data used for Ramsar
nomination) and the Gulf of Carpentaria, running workshops and monthly field id
days, producing educational signs for sites such as Boondall and Karumba,
participating in various environmental managment committees, and the list goes
on and on. The same can be said about the AWSG. Two of our
members have been on the AWSG excecutive, and they have literally
spent hundreds of voluntary hours working towards habitat protection etc.
One has to look no further than page 1 of yesterdays Weekend
Australian to see some of the results of the AWSG work. Amanda
Hodge cites AWSG data - the 90% decline in shorebirds in the Coorong.
Cannon netting is the highest profile activitiy of the wader study groups, as it
makes good television viewing, but it is by no means their sole activity, nor
even the most important priority.
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