BellingenNSW

Australia must double down to meet our climate targets. Our new study shows how

* "Australia is also one of the world’s biggest fossil fuel exporters, producing roughly 4.5% of global carbon dioxide emissions."

"Yet, the Albanese government has approved 37 new, expanded or extended fossil fuel projects since coming to power. It has 42 more in the pipeline for approval."

"This goes directly against the International Court of Justice which, in its 2025 advisory opinion on climate change, found licensing new fossil fuel projects can constitute an “internationally wrongful act". We already have a pathway to keep global warming below 1.5°C. What’s missing is the political will to take it." >>
https://theconversation.com/australia-must-double-down-to-meet-our-climate-targets-our-new-study-shows-how-291668

* A fossil fuel free Australia
https://climateanalytics.org/publications/a-fossil-free-australia
#FossilFuel #climate #ICJ #Australia #Pacific

The tech oligarchs’ world-abandoning project

* "Most people have the capacity for awe, to gasp at the jeweled beauty of a songbird or the otherworldliness of a whale’s exhalation or the intricate latticework of an ancient holy site. Children have the capacity for pure awe; so do 90-year-old actors in suborbital space. To experience awe is to dissolve into the swirl of the universe, to feel small in the best way. This sense of interconnection is also why we grieve when we witness strangers suffering, and feel the great sorrow of extinction. The fact that this capacity seems to be missing from the men who hold our collective fate in their hands is a personal loss for them – and an existential crisis for the rest of us."

"We are up against an ideology that has given up not only on the premise and promise of liberal democracy but on the livability of our shared world – on its beauty, on its people, on our children, on other species. There is something treasonous in this. Treasonous not to an abstraction like a flag or a nation, for we are not nationalists. But treasonous to the unspoken pact made with the web of life that sustains us." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/sep/13/end-times-fascists-essay

* End Times Fascism
And the Fight for the Living World, Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor >>
https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621384/endtimesfascism/
#earthbound #home #biodiversity #fascism #SpaceColonisation #SettlerCulture #frontier #violence #BigTech #militarism #FarRight #OrganisedAbandonment #ClimateBreakdown #WorldAbandoningProject #OuterSpace #life #habitability #books

The creeping extinction of koalas

A vigil will "mourn the death of a koala found injured during clear-fell operations in Pine Creek State Forest in July. Forestry Corporation confirmed the animal was found on 21 July within an active harvesting area."

"...We are still losing koalas to logging in the very compartments that should form the bridge.”

"Mr Elzer, a long-time Coffs Coast resident, said he has witnessed the extinction of all northern beaches koalas, which, decades ago, formed a healthy large colony. He fears that the remaining few in the heart of the city around the Coffs Creek bushland and east of the Sawtell link road will suffer the same fate in years to come."

“Without connectivity to the lush hinterland connecting Bongil Bongil National Park to Bindarri National Park, this small re-emerging colony will also become extinct,” he said." >>
https://coffscoast.newsofthearea.com.au/koala-dundee-to-hold-vigil-outside-parliament-house
#biodiversity #wildlife #koalas #NSWLogging #FCNSW #PineCreek #TheGreatKoalaNationalPark #CoffsHarbour #Sawtell #roads #SloMoExtinction #NSW #loss

Rabbits are the biggest threat to Australia’s native species. Why are their numbers booming again?

“They can get to incredible numbers and you see the whole landscape gets denuded."

"Though they were introduced on the first fleet during the British invasion in 1788, research has traced the species’ continent-wide spread to one consignment of 24 rabbits brought in to the country by settler Thomas Austin in 1859."

"By the 1920s, rabbits had reached plague proportions with estimates numbering them in their billions. More recent counts put the current population at closer to 200 million but the true number is unknown as there is no formal monitoring.Their impact on the landscape has been measured. One study found rabbits were having negative effects on 329 threatened species in Australia – more than any other invasive pest."

“Peri-urban areas have become a breeding ground because it is more difficult to have people control them there, mainly because the rabbits can be under buildings, for example, or in gardens." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/sep/14/rabbits-austraila-population-native-species-threat
#biodiversity #wildlife #pests #EuropeanLegacy #CoffsHarbour #PeriUrbanAreas #pets #NSW #SettlerSociety
#Image: Pet bunny with own real estate at Charlesworth Bay, Coffs Harbour. Many (ex-pet) rabbits hopping around the CBD.

Violence
* "Impact of colonisation on First Nations people far greater than previous estimates, research finds. Diseases and settler violence caused an estimated 2.06 million to die after the arrival of the First Fleet." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-15/extent-of-catastrophe-after-australias-colonisation-uncovered/107155538

* "Estimating the size of Indigenous populations in Australia before European colonial invasion is invaluable to truth-telling and reconciliation. Robust estimates of the population dynamics of pre-colonial Indigenous Australians are poor owing to lethal diseases, frontier and structural violence, and absence of systematic censuses.... We warn readers that the content of this study is confronting and possibly distressing." >>
Williams, A.N., Tobler, R., Griffiths, B. et al. Large estimated size of the Australian Indigenous population before its extensive decline following colonial invasion. Nat Hum Behav (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-026-02571-9
#violence #StructuralViolence #EuropeanColonisation #invasion #SettlerSociety #FirstNationsPeoples #colonisation #IndigenousPeoples #TruthTelling

"I'd like to see them stop killing dingoes in national parks … I think Australia should be ashamed [of that]."

"Division among graziers, Indigenous traditional owners and conservation groups over how to deal with New South Wales's dingo or wild dog population will be the focus of an inquiry."

"Meanwhile, there are concerns baiting and killing wild dogs could disrupt ecosystems and cause kangaroo numbers to skyrocket...When you take the dingoes away, kangaroo numbers erupt, a lot of our native animals disappear and our vegetation changes."

"They're the boss of Country, they maintain the delicate balance in the ecosystem we live in. We need to find places where dingoes can be left alone." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-08/debate-over-dingo-wild-dog-management-nsw-national-parks/107118112
#biodiversity #dingoes #NationalParks #ecosystem #graziers #livestock #meat #NSW

Automated decision-making, GovAI and a non existing human rights act

"Without laws requiring transparency or a right of review, our human rights will be rationed away by algorithmic and automated decision-making tools."

"Artificial – authoritarian – intelligence, automated decision-making, independent assessment tools and algorithms will shape the lives we live and the public support we receive...GovAI is set to become something more than an announcement." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/law/commentisfree/2026/sep/13/as-australia-faces-an-ai-generated-future-a-human-rights-act-is-needed-more-than-ever

#HumanRights #AI #AutomatedDecisionMaking #algorithms #surveillance #BigTech #GovAI #governance #care #biopolitics #HumanRightsAct #bureaucracy #thoughtlessness #TerrifyinglyNormal #BanalityOfAutomation

No future? Instability and wreckage

"At a time when the future feels increasingly uncertain, rightwing populist politics offers something simple and seductive: certainty, belonging and the promise of a return to an imagined past."

"AfD and One Nation may not look or even sound the same, but they are singing from the same song sheet."

"Climate disruption is intensifying amid economic insecurity, war and displacement...Legitimate fears about the future can too easily be used to turn people against each other." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/sep/13/the-far-right-is-becoming-normalised-in-germany-and-winning-australia-should-take-heed-ntwnfb
#FarRight #FossilFuels #climate #inequality #redistribution #ressentiment #DistrustCommunities #violence #future #instability #FutureNarratives

As Australia’s sea levels rise, safe land is vanishing and costs are huge

"Climate Council forecasts more than 267,000 coastal properties will be damaged by flooding by 2100, costing hundreds of billions of dollars."

"Kompas said the costs – an estimated $274.3bn in property losses and $580.7bn in land use damages – were a conservative estimate and did not take into account the additional impacts of coastal erosion or significant ice sheet melt."

"Kompas said that while reducing greenhouse gas emissions to limit global heating was of paramount importance, “we have to start planning and responding and adapting now. The first thing, of course, is not to build on flood plains, which is common still.” >>
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/sep/10/peters-farm-is-on-flood-country-as-australias-sea-levels-rise-safe-land-is-vanishing-and-costs-are-huge
#FossilFuels #SeaLevelRise #CoastalFlooding #Climate #ClimateCost #Coast #loss #FoodSecurity #BellingeShire

"Research painted a grim picture of the health and wellbeing of Victoria’s koalas."

"...We have a crisis in our koala populations in Victoria because we have a very concerning level of poor health and welfare.”

“Sitting on critical ecological data for over a year while koalas continued to suffer and disappear is a shocking failure of transparency and responsibility." >>
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/sep/10/victorias-koalas-in-chronically-poor-health-and-population-is-half-what-was-previously-estimated
#biodiversity #koalas #ExtinctionCrisis #OrganisedAbandonment

Rights to oppose mining projects ‘gutted’ by new laws

“What the laws are designed to do is to stop anyone who understands we are in a climate crisis from objecting to putting more CO2 in the atmosphere.”

"Lock the Gate Alliance national coordinator, Ellen Roberts, said the government was “tearing up democratic and environmental protections just to make life easier for mining companies – it is following Campbell Newman’s playbook to the letter”. >>
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/sep/16/queenslanders-rights-to-oppose-mining-projects-gutted-by-new-laws-activists-say
#FossilFuels #ClimateBreakdown #coal #energy #rights #law #governance #extractivism #environment

Bandicoots

* Our new research shows humans have maligned bandicoots for decades, making them more vulnerable to extinction

"Tragically, since European colonisation, eight of the 15 existing bandicoot (Peramelidae) species have become threatened or gone extinct. The populations that remain have all declined in numbers due to pressures from invasive predators, such as cats and foxes, as well as habitat destruction. However, humans have also directly contributed to their decline." >>
https://theconversation.com/our-new-research-shows-humans-have-maligned-bandicoots-for-decades-making-them-more-vulnerable-to-extinction-291653

* As miserable as a bandicoot’: 150 years of human-wildlife conflict with bandicoots in New South Wales, c. 1804–1954

"Our study shows that humans, as predators and persecutors, have negatively impacted bandicoot populations more than previously considered." >>
https://connectsci.au/pc/article/32/5/PC26059/276048/As-miserable-as-a-bandicoot-150-years-of-human
#biodiversity #wildlife #bandicoots #hostility #SettlerSociety #NSW #extinction #bushfires #cars #pets

Controlling feral animals and restoring native vegetation.
A court will decide the future of Yuraygir’s feral horses. That matters for native plants and animals

"Yuraygir National Park, on the coast of northern New South Wales on Yaegl and Gumbaynggirr Country, is a stunning landscape where you can see coastal emus and spot migrating whales from the shore."

"It is also home to a small feral horse population that is now at the centre of a legal dispute. The final hearing, taking place on Wednesday, could have repercussions far beyond feral horses."

"However, there is a strong ecological case for controlling feral horses. As large, hard-hooved, introduced grazing animals, feral horses can inflict significant damage to Australian ecosystems. They trample plants, compact soils, erode stream banks and disturb wetlands. This endangers many native species that rely on these fragile habitats, some of which live nowhere else. So feral horses must be managed with the same planning and urgency as other invasive animals."

"For now, we await a decision from the NSW Land and Environment Court. But to safeguard this sacred landscape, we must protect it from the hard hooves and hungry mouths of feral horses." >>
https://theconversation.com/a-court-will-decide-the-future-of-yuraygirs-feral-horses-that-matters-for-native-plants-and-animals-290522
#biodiversity #NationalParks #Yuraygir #Gumbaynggirr #FeralHorses #legacy #InvasiveSpecies
Image: emu eggs

Hot climate extremes and overcrowded industrial agriculture

• Extreme heat wave in France kills hundreds of thousands of poultry >> https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/06/extreme-heat-wave-in-france-kills-hundreds-of-thousands-of-poultry/

• "The ​heat is also hitting cattle farmers. High temperatures reduce feed intake, increase ​water demand and ⁠cut milk output. They're standing there with ​their mouths wide open, just trying to find air...It's very difficult, physically for people and for the animals." >> https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/record-heat-causes-mass-poultry-deaths-france-2026-06-24/ #FossilFuels #Climate #HotPlanet #FactoryFarming #livestock #Meat #poultry #cattle #pigs #DieOff #ExtremeHeat #water #cyanobacteria #eutrophication #Birds #wildlife #Biodiversity #MassMortalities #carcasses #agriculture #Pathogens #PoultryFlu #overstocking #habitability

• White Australia is challenging its ban in the High Court.

Several legal experts believe there is a significant prospect that the federal government's ban on Neo-Nazi group White Australia may be overturned by the High Court. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-07/will-high-court-let-neo-nazis-form-political-party/107103792

• AfD tops poll in German state of Saxony-Anhaltin in first far-right win since WWII

"The Alternative for Germany party has won more than 44 per cent of the vote in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, by far the most of any party. The result means a far-right party is on the cusp of forming government at the state level in Germany for the first time since World War II." >> https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-07/german-state-saxony-anhalt-elects-far-right-afd/107121828 #FarRight #NeoNazis #WhiteAustralia #HighCourt #Law #Australia #EU

Blackbirding by Ryan Butta

• "Australia has long reassured itself that, despite genocidal treatment of First Nations peoples, at least it has no heinous past of slavery, unlike Britain and the US. Ryan Butta shatters this historical self-deception. The term “blackbirding” (its etymology in the African and West Indies slave trades) involved the coercion and kidnapping of up to 62,000 Pacific Islander people, many children, to labour mostly on Australian sugar cane plantations between 1860 and 1906."

"Long portrayed as somehow “other” than slavery, Butta uses forensic archival work and compelling prose to disturbingly illustrate why this was Australia’s slave trade – and how a colonial who’s-who profited handsomely from it. – Paul Daley " >> https://www.theguardian.com/books/ng-interactive/2026/aug/05/best-books-to-read-australia-august-2026

• Book :"As Australia becomes more willing to confront the violence and trauma of its colonial past, one chapter has remained largely hidden: the Australian slave trade known as blackbirding." >> https://www.simonandschuster.com.au/books/Blackbirding/Ryan-Butta/9781923135703 #slavery #history #EngineeredForgetting ##Oceanic peoples blackbirding #Australia #sugar #plantations #books #EuropeanColonisation #violence

What climate pollution?
The UN to ensure Australian compliance with international law
The right to a healthy environment as mandated by international law

"A UN special rapporteur has intervened in Australia's decision to extend Woodside's North West Shelf gas project by another 40 years. Australia did not adequately consider the climate impacts of extending its largest gas project, an independent United Nations expert has told the Federal Court."

"We are living a triple planetary crisis, not only climate change, but also biodiversity loss and toxic pollution...The project's emissions — the third-highest in Australia — were likely causing irreversible damage to the World Heritage site, Murujuga, home to some of the world's oldest known rock carvings."

"As recently as last month, Australia was one of 141 countries to endorse a landmark resolution by the International Court of Justice, which found that states had a legal imperative to consider climate in their environmental impact assessments." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-06-04/un-special-rapporteur-woodside-north-west-shelf/106724220
#FossilFuels #climate #GHG #EPBCAct #UN #IndigenousPeoples #oilandGas #HumanRights #RockArt #FARA #biodiversity #environment #pollution #harm #burrup #Murujuga #law #RuleOfLaw

Australia’s 178 billionaires are $25.7bn richer than last year as 3.7 million live in poverty

"Oxfam finds the 20 richest Australians now hold more wealth than the bottom 3 million households."

“There is something fundamentally wrong with a system where extreme wealth keeps skyrocketing while so many people are struggling to afford the basics, and governments claim there is not enough money for housing, healthcare, climate action and essential services." >>

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/jun/02/australian-billionaires-richer-than-last-year
#inequality #Australia #SocialCohesion #CostOfLivingPressures #HousingAffordability #housing #healthcare #transport #tax #ClimateFinance #FossilFuels

Star-studded line up:
#Bellingen, #NSW
Image: #galaxies, #stars, #MilkyWay, #SolarSystem #Earth #Iphone

Welcome to Australia,
where you can have a wealthy private school or
koala habitat but not both,
First Dog on the Moon >>
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2026/jun/03/welcome-to-australia-where-you-can-have-a-wealthy-private-school-or-koala-habitat-but-not-both

Image: First Dog on the Moon, Guardian
#biodiversity #wildlife #koalas #values #trees #sprawl #bulldozing #Australia

Conservation Fast-track development Relationality

• "Despite the broad acclaim these legal personhood models have received, New Zealand’s government is unravelling protections for the environment. It has disestablished the Ministry for the Environment, attempted to weaken environmental protections in fisheries laws, and plans to reform the Resource Management Act to enable more widespread “fast-track” development." >> https://theconversation.com/nzs-overhaul-of-nature-protection-laws-is-a-chance-to-move-away-from-fortress-conservation-286647

• United Kingdom’s Rights of Nature Bill which passed its second reading in parliament. Rights of nature raise questions about the ethical basis of environmental protection and the implications of extending rights beyond humans. https://post.parliament.uk/rights-of-nature-ethical-frameworks/

#conservation #fasttrack #extractivism #EuropeanColonisation #WaterLaws #rivers #relationality #IndigenousPeoples #ethics #RightsOfNature #environment

Over half of Australia’s bookshops closed within a decade. Should the government help?
“Objects of culture” under “financial pressures”

“Bookshops are the safety vaults for the seeds of our country’s cultural and intellectual life.” Charlotte Wood

"In the past year alone, at least 13 independent bookshops have closed in Australia. Some have operated for decades."

"Fixed book pricing is common in Europe, where books are formally exempted from European Union competition rules, as “objects of culture”. This allows publishers and their distributors to determine the retail price of books."
>>
https://theconversation.com/over-half-of-australias-bookshops-closed-within-a-decade-should-the-government-help-283605
#books #BookShops #culture #reading #writers #regulation #megastores

Go and support your local independent bookshop/s!

Image: Seen on Bellingen's main drag at the #bellingenwritersfestival

"The Indian myna
was released in Victoria in the 1860s to eat insects but has become one of the highest-ranking pests on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List."

"It competes with native birds and wildlife, damages crops, can spread avian malaria and cause dermatitis, allergies and asthma in humans."

"There are calls for more councils to offer bounties, or for the state or federal governments to implement a coordinated management program. Grassy lawns and leftover pet food sustain Indian myna populations."

"There are calls for more councils to offer bounties, or for the state or federal governments to implement a coordinated management program." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-06-05/frustration-indian-myna-bird-driving-grassroots-action/106651956
#birds #InvasiveSpecies #native #wildlife #councils #pets #lawns #BellingShire #Bellingen

Nudging drivers to share the roads with wildlife

"Motorists are being urged to slow down and stay alert for wildlife as Transport for NSW launches its annual “Animals on Country Roads” safety campaign.

"Between 2016 and 2025, 26 people were killed and more than 1,250 crashes resulted in injuries involving animals on country roads. Kangaroos were involved in the highest proportion of fatal crashes involving animals in NSW, accounting for 44 per cent of deaths over the past decade."

“Driving on country roads means sharing the road with animals that can move quickly and unpredictably...Slow down, stay alert – especially at dawn and dusk – and take note of the animal warning signs. Also look out for animals near creeks and waterholes."

"The campaign runs until 30 June, encouraging motorists to take extra care on country roads and be prepared for unexpected wildlife hazards, including reporting injured animals to WIRES on 1300 094 737." >>
https://nambuccavalley.newsofthearea.com.au/look-out-for-wildlife-campaign
#cars #motorists #speeding #MobilityDesign #roads #HabitatFragmentation #wildlife #livestock #RoadKill #RoadTrauma
Image: Young passenger's view of native wildlife on NSW road shoulder

Taking from cars and giving to people

Kerbside parking - "Drivers are using a public road to park their private cars. What would happen if authorities banned on-street parking?"

"Australia actually has an oversupply of parking, both on streets and in parking lots...In many European nations, authorities have worked to make streets less centred on cars and parking." >>
https://theconversation.com/kerbside-parking-is-great-for-drivers-but-terrible-for-everyone-else-could-we-get-rid-of-it-283687
#cars #motorists #clutter #parking #pedestrians #space #micromobility #SegregatedPaths #footpaths
Image: Kerbside parking. Vehicles encroaching on the few footpaths, Bellingen

Planetary survival: An equal and habitable world is possible

"Global report provides an alternative to climate breakdown, political extremism and economic tensions. The report aims to rectify those limitations by incorporating inequality studies, climate science and proposals for creating a political coalition capable of reforming the world’s financial architecture. The World Inequality Lab is calling for hefty wealth taxes, reduced working hours, dietary changes and new investment priorities."

"The key, Piketty added, was to address inequality and planetary habitability together."

Liveability:
"Less mining, more education"
"Taxing extreme wealth"
>>
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jun/04/world-inequality-lab-equality-academics-planetary-survival
#FossilFuels #climate #inequality #habitability #education #meat #transition #energy #mining #extractivism #transition

Sea level rise threatens more than a quarter of a million properties as bill surges to $855b

"Climate change means Australia's love of the coast is facing a multi-billion-dollar reckoning, research suggests, as rising seas threaten to turn its prized coastal lifestyle into a question of who will foot the bill: property owners or governments."

"Australia could face damage costs of more than $850 billion, with more than $274 billion going to property losses and $580 billion spent on land-use damage."

"We keep warming the planet … so you get more sea level rise, you get higher tides, higher king tides, higher maximum tides," the professor of environmental economics and biosecurity at the University of Melbourne said." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-10/sea-level-rise-threatens-267000-properties/107131270
#FossilFuels #SeaLevelRise #CoastalFlooding #Climate #ClimateCost #Coast #loss #FoodSecurity #BellingeShire

NSW Greens MP pleads with federal colleagues not to back National party motion to block #koala park deal. >>
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/sep/08/nsw-greens-mp-pleads-with-federal-colleagues-not-to-not-to-back-national-party-motion-to-block-koala-park
#biodiversity #NativeForest #TheGreatKoalaNationalPark #climate #FossilFuels #pollution #offsets #con #regulation #CoffsHarbour #NSWLogging #ClimateFiasco

YOU HAD ONE JOB THE GREENS POLITICAL PARTY! Climate change is destroying life and you exist to save it!
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2026/sep/14/you-had-one-job-the-greens-political-party-climate-change-is-distroying-life-and-you-exist-to-save-it
#biodiversity #FossilFuels #koalas #NSW #TheGreatKoalaNationalPark #climateBreakdown

* The Great Global Transformation
The United States, China, and the Remaking of the World Economic Order, Branko Milanovic >>
https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/G/bo269830239.html

* The U.S., China, and the Remaking of the World Economic Order
"After unprecedented economic growth during the 20th century, is the U.S. losing its place as a world power? How have China’s economic rise and its growing class of uber-wealthy elites shaken up its society? How are the seismic changes to both countries reshuffling the global economic order?" >>
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xr1zscNHeYI
#geopolitics #USChinaRelations #WorldEconomicOrder #SeismicShifts #US #China #growth #elites #UberWealthy #plutocracy #nationalism #NationalMarketLiberalism #degeneration #protectionism #inequality #SocialMobility #homoploutia #book

* 'Homeless clearance'
Queensland homeless man shot with Taser after being given move-on order to make way for kite festival
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/sep/15/queensland-homeless-man-shot-with-taser-after-being-given-move-on-order-to-make-way-for-kite-festival-ntwnfb

* List of homeless encampment sweeps in the United States
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_homeless_encampment_sweeps_in_the_United_States
#homeless #unhoused #events #commercialisation #MoretonBay #HomelessClearance #HomelessEncarpment #dispersal #Americanising #inequality

"It has been more than a century since bilbies, bandicoots and burrowing bettongs roamed freely across outback New South Wales."

"Their local extinction here and throughout most of Australia’s mainland was due to cats, foxes and rabbits."

"Killer cats - The biggest threat to introduced species is feral cats, which kill more than a billion Australian native animals a year. We’ve got the worst extinction record of any country in the world...The combination of cats, foxes and too many rabbits basically obliterated many of these species from this landscape."

“All these skills sound like things they should innately know how to do, but they didn’t evolve with cats and cats have different hunting strategies.There’s a whole range of feral-free safe havens across Australia, but there are only a few places where there’s this work going on trying to expose native animals to feral predators and to train them."
And while Reece acknowledges Australia will never be rid of feral predators, their goal is a landscape where natives can survive their threat." >>
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09-08/wild-deserts-10-years-native-animals-quolls-bandicoots-bettongs/107085728
#restoration #ecology #wildlife #EcosystemEngineers #pests #cats

Taller hoods are a major contributor to crashes that kill pedestrians.

"More evidence is piling up that extra-tall vehicle hoods, increasingly common on American trucks and SUVs, are more dangerous to pedestrians."

"...Data from the 1990s found that a pedestrian hit by a light truck was two to three times more likely to be killed, with another study finding that light trucks were twice as likely to injure a pedestrian than a car, especially at low speed.” >>
https://www.planetizen.com/news/2024/01/127196-study-zeroes-dangers-taller-vehicles
#pedestrians #cars #SUVS #PickupTrucks #PedestrianFatalities #PedestrianDeaths #regulation
Image: Tall vehicle hood mingling with toddler and pram, Bellingen

Upgrades

* Connell Park sports fields closed for maintenance, Sept.15, 2026
" 270 tonnes of sand and organic top-dressing will be applied to the field to improve soil health. Council will notify of herbicide spraying following the guidelines of the Pesticide Use Notification Plan." >>
https://bellingenshirenews.com.au/2026/09/10/connell-park-sports-fields-closed-for-maintenance/

* Connell Park sports fields 'Upgrade": $9.5 million, Apr 23, 2026
"The total cost of the Connell Park precinct revamp and sports field upgrade in Bellingen, NSW, was $9.5 million." >>
#BellingenShire #ConnellPark #pesticide #herbicide #upgrades #Bellingen