Prior to the BA Congress in Alice Springs in August we spent time in
Katherine.
Denise Goodfellow wrote,
>"But there was little to be seen there or at
>The Katherine sewage ponds (it wasn't helpful that the birdwatchers'
>turnstile was locked)".
We were told by a local that the gate would be locked
[and it had been for some time previous to August]. We assume the reason it
is now locked is that each pond has it's resident Saltwater Crocodile
presumably since the time of the Katherine floods. And because of the Public
Liability crisis they have closed the ponds to birdwatchers rather than risk
a claim. It was interesting to note there was not one duck to be seen, is
this because of the croc's presence??
>"I brought up the locked gate with Christine Kelly of Knotts Crossing that
>night at dinner, also mentioning what appeared to be a general lack of
>interest in birdwatching tourism. I told her that on a previous trip
>staff at the shop in Nitmiluk Gorge were not interested in bird books,
>but in 'stuff sold by souvenir people', an attitude common throughout
>much of the Top End. Christine appeared quite frustrated - she has been
>trying for some time to encourage birdwatching in the area."
With regard to places like the NP centre at Nitmuluk not being interested in
stocking Bird Books. They do have some Field Guides [Slaters and Morecombes
if I remember correctly], including some little generalised books on NT
birds which were fairly superficial and not of any use to serious
birdwatchers. These books seemed to be in every roadhouse and shop down to
Alice Springs, whereas we could not find your book anywhere, Denise. I
assume the author of the little book whose name I can not recall must have a
good marketing agent who is pushing them!!
>"The next morning we went to the Fergusson River fifty kms further south.
> This is a favourite spot, and as far as I'm concerned ought to be a
>national park".
>"However we were not so happy to see that across the Stuart Highway the
>railway easement appeared to have taken out some of the habitat of an
>extremely rare plant, the beautiful pink and black flowered Grevillea
>benthamiana. I'd been concerned about this stand of plants for some
>time and was gratified to find that Noreen one of my students and the
>widow of Lord Mayor George Brown who died recently shared my feelings -
>her husband had fought hard to have this grevillea protected. We had
>hoped that because Greening Australia was involved the plant will be
>saved but the latest information I've had is that virtually all the
>plants have been removed".
The Fergusson River area was well known to birdwatchers back in the 80's.
John McKean who worked at the time, I think, for the NT Conservation
Commission [National Parks] put out a series of sheets on where to find
specific birds like Gouldian Finches. One of these spots was just south of
the bridge over the Fergusson, there is a rest area {part of the old
Highway], you walked down into the gully and if you were lucky Gouldians and
other finches would come to water there. We saw our first Gouldians there in
1989. On our trip this year we had only planned to go north to Katherine,
but while there we went up to Edith Falls, [what a change for the better in
the campground, since we were there last in 1994, wonderful!]. As we were so
close to the Fergusson we decide to have lunch there before backtracking to
Edith falls. Imagine our amazement to find the Finch area unrecognisable and
noisy work going on as the AD Rail people were doing up the old rail bridge.
Talking to various tourist people in Caravan Parks around the area, several
tourists [not birdwatchers] brought up the matter of "Terrible about the
railway destroying Gouldian habit". Apparently just prior to our visit the
railway had copped a fair bit of media flack over the issue and it was on
everyone's lips.
A few days later we were at Nitmiluk where I spoke to a NP Ranger. I
casually mention Fergusson river and the Railway to him. Well, the instant
reaction was startling to say the least. He launched, unasked, into a series
of excuses on behalf of National Parks and AD Rail. According to his version
of events AD Rail employ 2 consultants, one to deal with the matter of
Aboriginal Sacred Sites. The second is an environmental consultant, who
determines if the line is going to be a problem to certain environmental
issues. Part of this persons job was to go ahead of the right of way
clearing gang and identify sensitive areas. The day the right of way was to
be cleared up to the bridge this person was on a RDO or off sick or some
such. He had identified the area as sensitive and had said that the cleared
width in that area was to be halved back to just the width of the track.
Sounds fine, the railway has to go through and I guess it was sense to use
the old alignment up to the Fergusson river bridge. However the message did
not filter through to the bulldozer driver on the day. I would guess this is
the same with the Grevillea mentioned by Denise. HOW CONVENIENT FOR ALL
CONCERNED that their lines of communication were down on that particular
day!!!
John & Ruth Walter
Pittsworth SE Qld
27 43 31S 151 38 03E
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