birding-aus

Leave tbe twitchers alone.

To: Barney Enders <>, "" <>
Subject: Leave tbe twitchers alone.
From: Kim Sterelny <>
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 2015 11:51:47 +0000
Hi All

The kiwis have been trying out a similar idea with their "mainland island" 
program; fences tall, dug deep in, and fine-meshed, after they clear out 
possums, cats, dogs, stoats (not one of the better ideas in the biological 
control history), hedgehogs, and rats (not mice I think; the fence mesh is not 
that fine). There is one in Wellington, and its made a very visible difference; 
I used to live in Wellington until 2008 and am still there regularly, and there 
are now kakas, tui and other native birds all through the greater city area; I 
assume they forage widely but breed in the protected areas. Very expensive to 
set up and not cheap to maintain; and I doubt whether any of them are 21 square 
kilometres. But with the right species, they can really make a difference. 
There are tuatara and a fair number of the flightless and near flightless kiwi 
endemics in the Wellington reserve, breeding well. It would be no use for 
eagles, large owls, or other species that need a large range of their own; it 
could not support a breeding population. But for small insectivores, skinks an 
geckos; or birds like the kaka that are strong fliers and will range widely, 
but which are also capable of learning about safe areas (big parrots are smart 
birds) they can make a huge difference.

Kim

Kim Sterelny, School of Philosophy, Research School of the Social Sciences, 
Australian National University, Acton, 0200, ACT, Australia
 or 

61-(0)2-6125-2886

________________________________________
From: Birding-Aus <> on behalf of Barney 
Enders <>
Sent: Thursday, 13 August 2015 6:12 PM
To: 
Subject: Leave tbe twitchers alone.

Hi Chris, the Bilby Fence is at Currawinya National Park South of Eulo on
the Hungerford Rd.  South Western Qld just North of the border.

It was built at a cost of $ 400.000 or $ 550.000 depends who you talk to and
was finished in 2001.

It is an electrified predator and feral animal proof netting fence six foot
high with netting laying  on the ground on the outside to prevent predators

digging under and an outside flap of netting at the top that prevents
anything climbing over by it swinging down under their weight.



It is said to be 25 km long with some saying it fences in 21 sqr km. it was
built  for captive bred  Bilbies to get a wild breeding colony back into the
area

where they were once found in good numbers.

It was built with massive fundraising and large donations of fencing
material from  Cyclone, Waratah etc companies and many hours of voluntary
labour

including foreign backpackers.



A great success with the Bilbies breeding in good numbers only to be wrecked
when nobody thought to check the fence line to see if the netting had rusted

out during the big rains and floods.

The disaster was discovered in 2012 when it was found that cats had got in
and had wiped out the colony, much to the dismay of those involved with the

captive breeding and the years of fund raising, Save the Bilby etc.



There is a sample of the fence at the Currawinya Shearing Shed for tourist
to see but not even representatives from the companies that donated the
material

are allowed to the fenced area.



I had a look at it when I went to see the massive flocks of thousands of
Pelicans and Cormorants that nest on the lakes in the Park.

Barney

<HR>
<BR> Birding-Aus mailing list
<BR> 
<BR> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
<BR> http://birding-aus.org/mailman/listinfo/birding-aus_birding-aus.org
</HR>
<HR>
<BR> Birding-Aus mailing list
<BR> 
<BR> To change settings or unsubscribe visit:
<BR> http://birding-aus.org/mailman/listinfo/birding-aus_birding-aus.org
</HR>


<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>
Admin

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