Curlews on Vulture Street by Darryl Jones

Author:Darryl Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: NewSouth Publishing
Published: 2022-07-27T00:00:00+00:00

Transportation for crimes again humanity

As the first day of a new project, it certainly had plenty of variety. Unavoidably, this was work where everything happened in full view. It was clear that this ‘magpie conflict’ was much more complex than we’d initially thought. We had to be ready for anything, including unexpected reactions from the public, spanning, it seemed, everything from hero-worship to death threats. Sometimes at the same time. It was the people problem again.

The immediate problem was what to do with the captured magpie. Euthanasia was no longer an option, so what else was possible? Permanent captivity was also out of the question. (Ethically, but also for simple logistics: where would you keep hundreds of male magpies?) The logical solution was translocation, letting the bird go. But where?

This topic was already being debated ferociously by wildlife managers, conservationists and many others. The catalyst had been a study of translocated brushtail possums removed from houses in Melbourne. For no reason that anyone would later defend, all these animals were routinely released in a couple of bushland sites and effectively forgotten about. When someone decided to track the fate of these possums, they were shocked and appalled to find that most had died within a few days, mainly from predation by dogs and foxes. With hundreds of possums being dumped in a small area, it was hardly surprising that the more recent arrivals had nowhere to hide. Every hollow was full and new animals were not even able to climb the trees; there was nothing else they could do.

This tragedy resulted in the very concept of translocation being frowned upon, especially in any strongly territorial species. In the case of the ‘possum in the roof’ problem, most states now required that the animal be released at the site of capture, after ensuring it could no longer access its original den. The possum could continue to live in its territory but had to find another place to sleep, usually a nest box purposely installed in a nearby tree.

For other species, magpies included, serious questions were also raised. Was it ethical to remove an individual that lived permanently in a small patch? Would they survive somewhere else? Some states (well, only one) decided it was better to euthanise than let them go. I can’t say which state, but every time a magpie is ‘removed’, all hell breaks loose when the public finds out, as they often do. That too is hardly surprising.

To their credit, the Queensland authorities remained thoroughly opposed to any form of lethal control (they read the community attitude correctly on that) but were understandably worried about translocation. Would the birds just come back? What happens to the female and chicks? Would the male be able to set up a new territory? I suggested that we assess this properly, releasing marked males at different distances and carefully monitoring what happened. They agreed. Our grand experiment quickly attracted the attention of other states; nothing like this had been tried before and they all had magpie problems.

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