6 Australian Bird Species Pronounced Extinct

  • Thread starter Thread starter LOU
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the article is badly worded. Most of the birds discussed are subspecies of otherwise common species, not full species in themselves. The Norfolk white-eye hasn't been reliably recorded for quite a long time and everyone has pretty much known it is extinct for ages.
 
But it might highlight Australia's poor conservation history. Taronga Conservation Society has launched a funding program - $50,000 funding to whomever can come up with the next big conservation project, like earth hour, or clean up Australia Day - I was thinking something encouraging people to keep cats indoors would be a good one. Might just save some birds.
 
yeah absolutely. I wasn't meaning to imply that it was unimportant, simply making comment on the species/subspecies angle. It is of course an important story because the disappearance of these mainland birds is part of the larger picture
 
I agree that it was badly worded. People don't really pay attention until it's too late unless you can hit them in the face (figuritively) with out there facts. I tell people of the importance of putting away their cats, I recieve replies of "oh but mine would never kill anything" or "But my cat has bells and it's not fast enough". Around 90,000,000 native animals are killed by pet cats, it is estimated that over a third of that are birds. I'll now start using this article as an example in my talks.

The 90,000,000 deaths do not include those killed by feral cats, the actual figure could be closer to half a billion. Our small wildlife stands very little chance against these killing machines.

I acknowledge there are other factors at play here, but this is something we can act on.
 
Jarkari said:
"But my cat has bells and it's not fast enough".
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Studies have shown that cats with bells kill more wildlife than cats without bells.

:p

Hix
 
Hix said:
Studies have shown that cats with bells kill more wildlife than cats without bells.

:p

Hix
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Not surprised by that, one of the ladies I work with had five bells on her cat, and it came home with a possum, in fact a ring tailed possum which made it quite unusual as we don't usually have ringtails around Dubbo.

I wouldn't mind a law that allows us to shoot cats at night.
 
I've always said: "The best bell to put around a cat's neck is a church bell". Guaranteed to stop them killing wildlife.

:p

Hix
 
Jarkari said:
But it might highlight Australia's poor conservation history. Taronga Conservation Society has launched a funding program - $50,000 funding to whomever can come up with the next big conservation project, like earth hour, or clean up Australia Day - I was thinking something encouraging people to keep cats indoors would be a good one. Might just save some birds.
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A rather sad epitaph to 6 species gone forever (as extinction remains final and finite). Humbling also, in that mostly human activities are the mainstay of their extinction.

I agree with you 100% that the cat issue would be a better way for TCS to highlight why bird and marsupial disappearance and extinctions are just around the corner .... :mad:
 
Surely the day time would be better as you'd wake people up if it was during the night time.:D
 
Jarkari said:
People don't really pay attention until it's too late unless you can hit them in the face (figuritively) with out there facts.
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I absolutely agree. Just like climate change, the loss of biodiversity (which is in my humble opinion an even worse problem than climate change), the old [ame=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog]Boiling frog - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia[/ame] metaphor best describes it. People don't pay attention/don't care/even argue it is not a problem, until it is too late.
 
Monty said:
I did not know there was a law that said we could not.
Why only at night.
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But I believe if I was to kill my neighbours cat. I might get a knock on the door from a police officer or RSPCA Inspector. It was different when I was living on a property.
 
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