birding-aus

Birds, bats and the (unfunny and rather long) future

To:
Subject: Birds, bats and the (unfunny and rather long) future
From: Andrew Taylor <>
Date: Fri, 16 Mar 2001 11:05:25 +1100 (EST)
On Thu, 15 Mar 2001  wrote:
> For those who don't know, the RMBG is about to kill grey-headed
> flying foxes (fruit bats) in the gardens after the Victorian
> Environment Minister REJECTED a recommendation from the relevant
> Scientific Advisory Committee that the species be listed as
> endangered under the Victorian Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act.

Its worth noting that this not a local issue.  The population of fruit
bats in the Melbourne Botanic Gardens is claimed to have increased
sharply but Grey-headed Flying Foxes reproduce only slowly.

Females bear at most one pup per year and generally have to be three
years old before they can successfully raise a pup.  In other words,
Grey-headed Flying Foxes reproduce at a similar rate to the Bustards
being discussed early.

Much of the population increase at the MBG must have come from
immigration.  As little or no breeding occurs elsewhere in Victoria,
the immigration presumably has come from NSW.  Its thought that when
food is scarce in coastal NSW, GHFFs will move into Victoria.

Killing GHFFs in the MBG will not stop the immigration.  The MBG's plan
must be to create a "black hole" for GHFFs and hence kill a sufficiently
large fraction of the GHFFs in Victoria and NSW that they no
longer create a problem in the MBG.

I'd have no problem with GHFFs being stopped using the MBG and could
accept some Flying Foxes being killed in the process, but this is
outrageous.  We need an agreeement between Australian states to protect
migratory/nomadic species - similar to the international treaties which
protect migratory birds.

A lot of info about GHFFs (but not the MBG problem) can be found in:
http://batcall.csu.edu.au/abs/ghff/ghffproceedings.pdf

Andrew Taylor


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The University of NSW School of Computer and Engineering takes no responsibility for the contents of this archive. It is purely a compilation of material sent by many people to the birding-aus mailing list. It has not been checked for accuracy nor its content verified in any way. If you wish to get material removed from the archive or have other queries about the archive e-mail Andrew Taylor at this address: andrewt@cse.unsw.EDU.AU