Hi all
Good people like us KNOW how homo ignorans is stuffing up
our environment.
But how do you convert homo ignorans into homo sapiens ?
So much of what I and my mates do is about urban
biodiversity. Sometimes that is important in itself because
so many of our cities have been dumped on crucial ecological
sites (deltas, intersections of bio-regions...).
As a result rescuing key sites is still of major
importance. But saving ecosystems is much more difficult
and I suppose I am one who tries to ignore what Hugh
Possingham has called 'extinction debt'. At some sites we
are seeing birds - even more so terrestrial vertebrates -
which will soon be gone despite all our efforts to save the
sites.
I could go on. But I reckon the main role of us - we are I
guess mainly urbanites - is to use what urban biodiversity
remains for community education and development.
But the tools, resources, contacts, skilled people.... are
generally not funded ?
I would really like your responses. Please send them to me
and I will in about 6 weeks' time (after the local
elections!) summarise.
Michael Norris
Bayside Friends of Native Wildlife
PS Today I had year ticks of Blue-billed Duck, Long-necked
Tortoise and Buff-banded Rail at the urban Gresswell Lakes
where Little Bitterns were recorded breeding earlier this
year. These "lakes" are pure artifacts for stormwater
filtering and possibly ground water recharge.
Birding-Aus is on the Web at
www.shc.melb.catholic.edu.au/home/birding/index.html
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