We hear more in the news about the western front of toads, now very close to the border of Western Australia. However, there is a dedicated group of rangers working in Northern NSW to keep the toads at bay on their southern front. A clever interpretation officer, Kerry Cooper, came up with this song and her kids are the wonderful voices.
The toad call is clearly heard. The males call to attract the females down to the water's edge.
We've got a terrific project running in Northern New South Wales, bringing a huge number of players together that have an interest in wild dog control. I thought it would be an excellent topic for Feral Talkback on ABC 666 but I got distracted when the office temp mentioned she was from the area. Specifically, she was from Emmaville, a New England town famed for the "Emmaville Panther" - one of Australia's more frequently sighted big cats.
The Emmaville Panther is not alone: there is the mainland thylacine, the Grampians Lion or Puma, the Cordering Cougar, the Queensland Tiger, the Beast of Buderim, the Lithgow Panther, the Tarana Tiger and the Blue Mountains Panther, and probably many more.
Do we simply dismiss these reports out of hand? In 2001 the NSW DPI investigated the Lithgow Panther sightings because so many were received from credible people and the then Director General, Kevin Sheridan, was reported as being concerned about the Department's duty of care should a human injury occur. No evidence of a panther was found. Deakin University is reported to have investigated the Grampian Lion.
The Emmaville Panther was widely reported during 1956-57 and 340 sheep are reported to have been killed on "Pretty Gully", a property near Uralla. The origin of the panther/lion/puma in this instance and most others tends to be based on escaped circus animals or mascots left by American servicemen. However, the Sydney Sun (reported via the website www.thylacoleo.com) in 1969 interviewed Arthur Davies who claimed to have trapped a panther in 1939. Arthur's panther bore remarkable resemblance to the Marsupial Lion, the largest Australian mammalian carnivore, which became extinct in the Pleistocene era, maybe 10,000 to 25,000 years ago, certainly after Aboriginal settlement.
I reckon getting nine Rural Land Protection Boards in Northern NSW working on the Wild Dog Demonstration site represents work aplenty for researchers Peter Fleming and Guy Ballard, without having to worry about panthers/lions/puma/thylacoleo for the moment. Mind you, any sightings to date unreported would be welcome on ABC 666 Mornings with Alex Sloan 1 300 681 666 after the news at 10 Wednesday 22 August.
Besides panthers, we'll talk about the wild dog project and remind listeners about the University of Canberra's Open Day this Saturday and the Canberra Indian Myna Action Group's public meeting at Wests Club from 7.30 Wednesday 22 August.
The Invasive Animals CRC's Board met in Brisbane on 15 August. The evening before a number of Directors met Queensland-based CRC Participants and attended a seminar by Professor Rob Capon outlining progress on cane toad chemical ecology.
There were few decisions at the meeting that impact directly on Participants. Directors reviewed the pre-audit annual accountants and examined the operational plan. They conducted my annual performance review, looked at a range of participant relationship issues and planned for the coming AGM. The Board examined review papers on intellectual property and the Terrestrial Program.
Directors formally welcomed the appointment of Andreas Glanznig as the CRC's Chief Operating Officer and looked forward to him commencing on 3 September. Our Finance Manager, Susan Duson was appointed Company Secretary. The Board congratulated Director Mark Lonsdale on his appointment as Chief of CSIRO's Division of Entomology, and former PAC CRC Director Ed McAlister AO on receiving an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Adelaide.
The next Board meeting will be a brief one ahead of the AGM in Canberra on 24 September and then the new Board will meet in Orange, NSW, on 14 November.
On average we have a mouse plague every four years or so in Australia. I wonder how long before the next one.
In 1990 Australia had 22 exotic fish in our waterways and now we have about 34. All the newcomers, bar one, originated from the aquarium trade.
So it is great to see Agriculture Minister Peter McGauran announce that the States and Commonwealth have finalised an Ornamental fish agreement which will now be implemented. It is a really complex and large industry and this agreement has taken a lot of time and effort to work out. The Minister's announcement is at http://www.maff.gov.au/releases/07/07108pm.html
It is important that when people buy pet fish they know that they can become feral pests. If you move house and can't take the fish with you, don't dump them in the local lake or river. Fishermen also have to be very careful if they use live bait fish. For example Oriental weatherloach appear to have been moved from the Canberra area to the Snowy Mountains through people using them as bait. Recent genetic work by IA CRC student Gwilym Haynes indicates that the common carp infestation of Tasmanian lakes Crescent and Sorrell probably came from Wyangala Dam in NSW. Since 1995, that infestation has cost Tasmanian taxpayers millions of dollars and the lakes were closed for fishing for a decade.
A recent seminar hosted by the Invasive Animals CRC on advances in cane toad research sparked a frenzy of media attention. Pestat Pty Ltd, one of the CRC's participant companies revealed development of a lethal spray - HopStop - which they are seeking to register for household use. Sydney Uni's Rick Shine revealed latest research on a lungworm, Rhabdias, that debilitates cane toads and might be useful for slowing down their advance across the Top End. Queensland Uni's Rob Capon explained how his lab is unravelling the chemical ecology of the toad, trying to find chinks in its armour. Collaboration between these two universities is leading to the unravelling of an alarm pheromone emitted by distressed cane toad tadpoles.
Some of the media response is shown below.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,21969125-5005941,00.html
http://www.abc.net.au/canberra/stories/s1963235.htm
Our Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre PhD students are each undertaking 80 days of training in things like media, communications skills, intellectual property, the funding environment, working in teams and self awareness. We call the program "Balanced Scientist" because we think that the program's graduates will be more effective because they are receiving a wider range of training opportunities.
We don't expect them to simply squeeze the training into their research time. We've arranged to give them extra scholarship time. Because most of them are working with animals or natural systems, the extra time also helps if they lose a season's data or animals don't behave as planned.
I recently went out for a day with the Kimberley Toad Busters, a community group trying to stop the cane taod getting from the Northern Territory into Western Australia. I found this toad at Gregory's Tree in the NT. He had probably been burnt in a grassfire and pecked at by a bird. Nevertheless, he was very much alive and a testament to the resiliance of individual toads. Presumably he would have eventually starved to death.
Darwin is the place to be in June 2008. The Vertebrate Pest Committee hosts a conference every three years and Darwin is set to be a beauty. The Organising Committee is calling for symposia topics, review proposals and suggestions for sessions now and will pull together a program that covers the gamete of invasive animal issues facing the region. To find out more, go to http://www.abcon.biz/vertebrate.html
