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This email from Inger is really lovely. Thank you.
Judith.
Hi Mike,
Thanks for that. I am an apartment dweller in
Sydney and so my 'garden' is the nearby National Parks. I also
put up signs on my apartment noticeboard encouraging some of my
neighbours to not feed the lorikeets that visit them regularly (but if
they must then try to pick grevilleas and put them in the feeding tray
so as not to encourage bad habits) . I have seen people feeding
birds both bread and chocolate - not great.
I have also done surveys of the birds around my
building and photographed them, creating posters that have gone on the
apartment block noticeboard. Neighbours that I haven't known
have stopped by and showed their kids these posters and read the
information in the posters to them. It's a small effort on my
part being the 'anonymous' composer of these where I can sit by and
watch people's reaction to them :-). When I first started doing
it, I thought they would be torn down as noone has interested but it
was with some amusement that I visited an old neighbour from a block I
lived in two years ago and found them still hanging there
:-).
Creating these costs me virtually nothing in time or
money but has given me tremendous satisfaction as I feel I have done
something to raise people's awareness of their local avifauna in an
apartment metropolis like Hornsby which also has a huge ethnic
population. I usually create funny stories or tell people about
birds as if I were the birds talking to them - an idea which sounds a
bit silly but at least it hits the spot and people take notice.
A small effort but with big impact. If we all did
something like this and got the information outside of birding circles
- imagine the difference we would make?
Incidentally I didn't advise this on my first mail but
the member of the public who questioned me about photographing
swamphens also mentioned that they were good eating and he himself had
dined on a few when he lived on a farm in northern NSW! :-).
Seriously though, even on this day and with the
conversation I had with this gentleman. He brought his 7 year
old grandson over to talk with me where I explained the differences
between the Pacific Black Ducks, the Coots, Purple Swamphen, a couple
of introduced Muscovy ducks, one domestic Goose and one lost looking
Hardhead among the collection of animals present on that lagoon.
Had I looked a bit further I may have even discovered a Rail
amongst the reeds.
I guess what I am trying to say - the trick in getting
people to take note of what is around them is to be able to tell a
good story. I often get asked to take groups along on bushwalks
so I can point out stuff to them that they might not normally see.
I have done this with both colleagues from work and friends and
family. Even David Attenborough admits (although I hardly
compare myself with him) that he is no scientist - he just tells a
good story. And MOST IMPORTANTLY to not lose faith in humans -
there are more of us out there that care than what you would think -
it's just plain ignorance.
To answer David, I am also from the country and now
live in Sydney where I have done so for just over 6 years. I
feel it is a bit of my responsibility to tell people what's around
them as I probably look at my surroundings through different
eyes.
Until the collective public knowledge is increased
through individuals stepping outside their 'circles', I guess I will
have to keep plugging and continue to enjoy the visiting lorikeets who
fly around to every window of my flat looking to see if I am up or the
two baby brushtail possums that watched me put my washing out last
night. My secondary alarm clock in the morning is either a Tawny
Frogmouth in the winter or Koels in the summer. An apartment
city Hornsby may be, but it is still a small slice of nature to me and
I don't even have to go too far to look at it :-).
I guess it's the old adage, you can take the girl out
of the country but can you ever take the country out of the
girl?
Cheers,
Inger
Mike Tarburton
<>
Sent by:
07/07/2005 09:04
AM
To:
Inger
cc:
bcc:
Subject: RE: [BIRDING-AUS]
Re: blackface
G'day fellow birders
Inger has made a couple of points that I think are very valid, both in
Australia and up here in PNG.
I print off some of my bird photos onto A3+ photo paper and laminate
them. I include a little text and place them on public
noticeboards. This creates interest and comment and we are at
the stage of developing more permanent interest and commitment to
looking after the wildlife. This is something PNG has a great
need of, but attitudes are changing for the better. I use the
names from the standard field guide as the locals already know their
names and expect us to have different names.
Incidentally your name of "redbills" is similar to "red
combs" the name widely used up here for Purple Swamphens - a bird
that gets eaten along with most other species on this island. I
recall that in Fiji all birds have indigenous names except five that
were too small to eat and they all got clumped under the name
"gigi"
Happy watching and communicating
Mike Tarburton
Dr Mike Tarburton
Dean: School of Science and Technology
Pacific Adventist University
PMB, Boroko
Papua New Guinea
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