Monthly Archives: September 2008

Dog of the week – Sole

This is Sole (sorry girl but I haven’t quite worked out how to insert the grave over the “e” so that your name is spelt properly!).
Sole is one of our many dogs and one of my absolute favourites. She is, true to her name, a dog who keeps her own counsel – she can be [...]

Australia is so…boring

“Australia is so…boring!!” So said the Professor from the University of KwaZulu Natal when I was in South Africa recently. “How so?”, I asked, taking a mild and curious offense to his statement.
He proceeded to explain that he’d been to Australia a few times over the years and that his views had been confirmed by [...]

800 guardian angels killed by a sacred banyan tree

This report from the Wildlife Trust of India tells of the tragic deaths of more than 800 Asian Openbill Storks, Anastomus oscitans. The birds, mostly nestlings and juveniles, died when the banyan tree they were nesting in collapsed last week.
“Most of the admitted birds are chicks and fledglings. Many are severely injured, with fractures on [...]

Mad Mal Brough – goodbye and good riddance

I gave up on hate as a waste of time many years ago and it is a very rare moment now that I can be bothered to even strongly dislike someone. Contempt and pity rise a little more easily but are still occasional pleasures. And I don’t like seeing small furry animals in pain and [...]

Buenos Aires – mugging and pick-pocket capital of the world?

I’m in Argentina at the invitation of BirdLife International, my favourite conservation NGO of all time.
Unlike many/most NGOs, it works from the bottom-up (I don’t like that top down/bottom-up analogy/metaphor/simile but it’s the best I can find for now), with most of its membership spread around the globe working on small, community-based bird conservation projects, [...]

The Northern Myth – a short introduction

B R Davidson’s book “The Northern Myth” was first published in 1965 and set out to dispel the then popular belief that tropical Australia could be transformed into a magical land of milk and honey from which boundless agricultural wealth would flow.
Davidson’s book should be mandatory reading for any contemporary politician who puts “the north”, [...]