Category Archives: logging

Magpies, kookaburras and willie wagtails among common Australian birds ‘starting to disappear’,

Magpies, laughing kookaburras and willie wagtails are on the decline in some regions, a report tracking the health of Australia’s bird populations has found.  Birdlife Australia, analysed data collected in more than 400,000 surveys across the country, the majority done by bird-loving volunteers.  The State of Australia’s Birds Report states that while predators including cats, habitat loss and even changes in climate might be to blame, more research was needed before certain species became endangered.  Habitat loss and changes are polite euphemisms for human destruction, such as land clearing and degradation for mining, logging, industries and urbanization!
kookaburra

(image: “Poser (543749091)” by aussiegall from Sydney, Australia – PoserUploaded by russavia. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons)

Sightings of kookaburras have decreased at a rate of 40 per cent across south-eastern Australia. Magpies have declined significantly on the east coast, a new report shows. The Eastern curlew, a migratory shorebird that has recently been declared critically endangered.

Editor of Australian Birdlife Sean Dooley said the decline of common birds in parts of Australia was a surprise to researchers.

Numbats, malas, bandicoots and bettongs are among the mammals the Federal Government’s identified in its new Threatened Species Strategy. The birds include the mallee emu-wren and Norfolk Island boobook owl.

The Environment Minister Greg Hunt says feral cats are a serious threat to native species and that he wants the feral animals eradicated from five islands and 10 mainland enclosures within five years. Hunt has also set a target of 10 new cat-free enclosures on mainland Australia by 2020.

Dr Euan Ritchie is with Deakin University. He wants native predators like dingoes and Tasmanian devils reintroduced, as a natural way of culling foxes and cats. This is an enlightened approach to the status of Dingoes that have been vilified and trapped over decades as a threat to livestock! He also wants Tasmanian devils back to the mainland.

Ms Jane Nathan says in The Age 16 July 2015 that Melbourne is headed for eight million by 2050, and goes on to describe what it will be like in the most wildly optimistic tones imaginable. She says “our social harmony, kaleidoscopic culture, clean food, innovative education systems and greatly reduced crime rates are the envy of the world. Our neighbourhoods are artistic, green and pristine”.

According to MP Kelvin Thomson, in the Federal seat of Wills, it “Sounds like paradise. The problem is, there is no evidence to support it…And as for green and pristine, just this week it was reported that even common Australian birds, like the Willy Wagtail and the Kookaburra, were being sighted much less frequently. The reason for this is that the streets of mature gardens that used to give our birds food and shelter have been replaced by multi-unit developments and high rise. The vegetation has been destroyed, and the birds have died out”.

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Petition for a Great Forest National Park for Victoria

To: Premier Daniel Andrews
Petition for a Great Forest National Park for Victoria

Dear Premier and Ministers of Victoria

Victoria urgently needs a comprehensive, representative national park and conservation system. Major threats to nature such as habitat loss land degradation, invasive species, logging, harmful fire regimes, over-grazing, modified water flows still persist. 1

Precious habitat remnants are being bulldozed for urban expansion or roads. Victoria is the most cleared state in Australia, populations of native birds and animals are in free-fall, and less than 25% of our rivers and creeks are in good condition. 2

The Great Forest National Park proposes that Victorians create and add a new 355,000 hectares of protected forests to the existing 170,000 hectares of parks and protected areas in the Central Highlands of Victoria.

The tallest flowering trees on Earth grow north-east of Melbourne. In their high canopies dwell owls, gliders and the tiny Leadbeater’s (or Fairy) Possum. Victoria’s precious and endangered faunal emblem lives only in these ash forests of the Central Highlands. 3

We demand that the State government act on the overwhelming support for the creation of a Victorian Great Forest National Park.

1 VICTORIAN NATIONAL PARKS ASSOCIATION, September 2014, NATURE CONSERVATION REVIEW: Overview and context

2
http://environmentvictoria.org.au/blog/posts/needles-haystack#.VTndPM2hSPo

3
http://www.greatforestnationalpark.com.au/

Why is this important?

Victoria is the most cleared State, and there are major threats to our native species and vegetation. There are ongoing issues such as habitat loss and degradation, invasive species, harmful fire regimes, over-grazing, logging of old growth forests, and modified water flows. Our faunal emblem, the Leadbeater’s Possum, is critically endangered, and lives in the Central Highlands of Victoria. A new 355,000 hectares of protected forests to the existing 170,000 hectares of parks and protected areas in the Central Highlands of Victoria is urgently needed.

by Vivienne Ortega on behalf of AWPC

Sign the Petition

 

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Swift parrots diving into extinction: logging to blame

Study: Swift Parrot Population May Decline Up To 94 Percent In 12 To 18 Years.

swiftparrot1

Sugar gliders are being blamed for the grim numbers, but researchers are ready to do what it takes to save the swift parrot. The study found that “when sugar gliders prey on the swift parrot nests in areas where there was high forest loss, 83 percent of the time the animals ate the eggs and mother.” In some cases, the mortality rate could be as high as 100 percent. So, it’s all about cause and effect, and increasing competition for dwindling resources.

Researcher Dejan Stojanovic said the research found if nothing changed, the bird’s population would decline by as much as 87 per cent.

Across southeastern Australia, the forests and woodlands where swift parrots live have been converted to farmland, swallowed by urban sprawl and been chipped away by logging.

These processes are well known to drive the decline of forest wildlife, but until recently, we didn’t fully understand the subtler effects of deforestation on swift parrots.

The Conversation: Sugar gliders are eating swift parrots – but what’s to blame?

They are very light birds, weighing about half as much as a banana – which is lucky, because they fly ridiculously long distances during winter, to forage for food and to escape the Tasmanian winter. These are tiny, kaleidoscopic technicolour parrots fly all over Australia, but come back to breed in the forests of Tasmania.

They may be going to the way of the dodo, researchers say.

Environment Tasmania said information documents revealed evidence of the Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment (DPIPWE) that approving logging in parrot breeding habitat despite strong scientific advice against activity in the areas. The DPIPWE departmental group also advised that logging was “… likely to interfere with the recovery objectives of the species”.

Parrot breeding habitat had already been extensively logged over recent years and that made remaining patches of swift parrot breeding habitat more important. They migrate from the Australian mainland to Tasmania to breed each spring, swift parrots rarely reuse the same nesting area in successive years. They nests are most abundant in old growth forests, but finding nests for research demands an intensive annual search across the east coast forests of Tasmania.

“Everyone, including foresters, environmentalists and members of the public will be severely affected if they go extinct,” said Professor Heinsohn from the ANU Fenner School of Environment and Society.

Swift parrots are major pollinators of blue and black gum trees which are crucial to the forestry industry, which controversially continues to log swift parrot habitat.

Making things go from bad to worse, Forestry Tasmania is considering selling nearly 40,000 hectares of hardwood plantations, after the Tasmanian Government gave it the green light to sell assets. Selling hardwood plantations would force Forestry Tasmania to log more native forests, which would “drive to the brink” endangered species like the swift parrot and the masked owl. Native species are now no more than collateral damage in the quest to capitalize our our natural heritage, and resources.


Mr Roderick from Birdlife Australia estimates there are three to four hundred regent honeyeaters remaining, making it and the swift parrot the two most endangered of a whole suite of threatened woodland birds.

A recent Wilderness Society report has found Tasmania’s Regional Forest Agreement (RFA) is failing to protect forests and wildlife. Spokesman Vica Bayley said so far the agreement had been a failure. “We are still logging critical habitat for species such as the swift parrot,” he said.

Petitions:
Help save critically endangered Swift Parrots and Regent Honeyeaters in the Hunter Valley!

Urge the Tasmanian government to protect the endangered swift parrot to save it from extinction

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Victorian state emblem Leadbeater’s possum pushed closer to extinction

Victoria’s state animal emblem, the Leadbeater’s possum, is set to be formally recognised as being on the brink of extinction. But the state government has again stopped short of backing a new national park to protect the Leadbeater’s habitat, which conservationists and many scientists say is crucial to ensuring the species’ survival.

The species lives primarily in the ash forests and sub-alpine woodlands of Victoria’s central highlands, with a small lowland population to the east of Melbourne.

In face of this challenge, Environment Minister Lisa Neville will instigate more surveys, without actually promoting what’s actually needed – a new National Park! More paper-shuffling, procrastination, political spin and riding roughshod over the best advice, but no actual progress in protecting our State’s dying emblem from the threatening process – logging!

This Fairy Possum is so elusive it was thought to be extinct until it was re-discovered in 1961. It’s endemic to Victoria. We all know what needs to be done to save it… the extinction of the species is entirely preventable. Australian Paper’s ongoing use of wood pulp from VicForests, which fails to meet sawmill production quality standards, is sourced from known Leadbeater’s possum habitats. Populations of large, old trees necessary for the survival of Leadbeater’s Possum (and many other vertebrates) are crashing to historically low levels. Unburned and unlogged old-growth forest now covers just 1.16% of the mountain ash forest estate – probably the most limited extent in the evolutionary history of this tree species.

Leadbeater’s Possum is an arboreal marsupial with soft grey fur. It has a prominent dark brown stripe along its back and is pale underneath. Its ears are thin, large and rounded and it grows up to 17 cm in length. Its thick tail grows to 18 cm in length. A wildfire in 1939 created suitable habitat for the Leadbeater’s Possum’s current range and led to a peak in population numbers, estimated to be about 7500 individuals in the early 1980s. This population estimate is predicted to undergo a 90% reduction by 2025. Nobody would call this population dwindling “sustainable”.

According to official State government sources, the Victorian Government is committed to supporting the recovery of the State’s faunal emblem – the endangered Leadbeater’s Possum.

The Leadbeater’s Possum Advisory Group was established in 2013 to provide recommendations that support the recovery of the possum, while in an apparent oxymoron, is committed to maintaining a sustainable timber industry – the same “sustainable” timber industry that’s largely wiping out the species!

In a great twist of irony, a mixture of oxymorons, and loaded contradictory terms, the government is trying to “save” the Leadbeater’s Possum, whilst at the same time preserving the environmental and socio-economic values of our logging the old-growth forests – their home! Surely the species dependant on the forests are integral to their environment, and can’t be surgically dissected from logging profits! Wonder what the important “socio-economic” values of the logging industry are if it destroys our own State’s native emblem in the process?  More like bulldozer diplomacy.

New measures by our State government include VicForests commencing a program of remote camera surveys to look for Leadbeater’s Possum colonies in targeted areas planned for harvest, that will complement existing measures such as the protection of habitat and retention harvesting in forest outside of the reserve system. (Premier of Victoria media release: Protecting Victoria’s Iconic Leadbeater’s Possum Friday 17 April 2015)

Leadbeater's_Possum_called_George_-_taxidermied_01

(image: George is a taxidermied male Leadbeater’s Possum (Gymnobelideus leadbeateri) that Friends of Leadbeater’s Possum uses for it’s educational work concerning this threatened species. George was found dead but intact on the side of a logging road about 2011 in the Victorian Central Highlands. It is assumed that George’s home in the mountain ash (Eucalyptus Regnans) forests was a victim of logging, and as his home was being carted away he fell off the logging truck.)

They are going to great length to preserve their political integrity, and their reputation as being environmentally friendly, with a “proud history of protecting and enhancing the natural environment”… but fall short of actually ending the timber harvests in the Central Highlands of Victoria the Leadbeater Possums rely on!  You can’t keep your cake and eat it too.

The proposed Great Forest National Park park would add 355,000 hectares of protected forests to the existing 170,000 hectares of parks and protected areas in the Central Highlands of Victoria by amalgamating a group of smaller parks. The park would stretch from Healesville to Kinglake in the west, through to Baw-Baw plateau in the east and north to Eildon. A new national park is needed not only to conserve possums and forests, but to protect carbon stocks, water supplies and lower the risk of bushfires. Surely such a new forest National park would be a win-win for Victoria, on numerous levels, and embrace much more socio-economic values that VicForests’ destructive logging “harvests”.

Numerous conservationists and scientists – including Sir David Attenborough and Dr Jane Goodall – have supported a campaign to set up the “Great Forest National Park” in the region, which would encompass much of the highlands forest.  The value of the forests for their natural qualities can’t be seen for the dollars worth of the trees!

The Australian Greens say that the Future of our forests treated as little more than garbage. “The time has come to acknowledge that Regional Forest Agreements have failed to protect our carbon stores, our water catchments, our local jobs and communities, and so many of our unique plants and animals,” said the Greens forests spokesperson Senator Janet Rice. “We’ve seen the impact Regional Forest Agreements have had on the decline of the Swift Parrot in Tasmania and the Leadbeater’s Possum in Victoria – they are both hurtling towards extinction”.

Letterboxing for the Great Forest National Park– The Wilderness Society.

 

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