Guy Ballard’s Tweets

Australian girls are being 'sold' to future husbands - and authorities are fearing a spike in...

Mar 5

Wanted: philanthropist to fund 20 hard-working wildlife ecologists, indefinitely. Only 5 staff in our research team are ‘permanent’; the rest ALL deserve to be. Fact: Senior staff spend lots of time trying to keep everyone employed, instead of doing research.

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Cheers to folks for the kind (presumptuous?) Fathers Day wishes; your Mum and I were just good friends.

Respect #women

Kubra* was just 11-years-old when she became engaged to her older cousin. The Sydney girl tried to convince her family the relationship was "toxic", but her pleas fell on deaf ears.

17h

Plant local native trees on your grazing land.

Planting trees on grazing land was ridiculed in the 60s but John Fenton left an environmental legacy

When the late John Fenton inherited land in1956, he raised eyebrows by building wetlands and planting forests, creating shelter for stock and transforming a near treeless farm into an environmental...

18h

The ‘United States of Extinction’ is awful. Hold the schadenfreude Australians; we’re worse. extinctionmap.org/index.html

Guy Ballard Retweeted

Lydia Petze

@lydia_petze

18h

This is really something. #FooFighters

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Tara Dublin

@taradublinrocks

· 19h

Taylor’s son Shane Hawkins! #MyHero

#taylorhawkinstribute #TaylorHawkins #FooFighters #TaylorHawkinsWembley

1:58

1.3M views

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Sep 2

Let’s add ‘real incentives for land managers to build the conservation value of their properties’ to the list. Use the tax system and subsidies to reach and maintain conservation targets. It will benefit all.

‘Nature credits’ smells a lot like a consultant / lobbyist’s idea. The simple alternative: strong legislation and enforcement, proper tax rates for corporations and science-led investment in conservation action is much more appealing.

'Nature credits' could make Australia the 'Green Wall Street' for the world: Plibersek

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek tells a G20 meeting that Australia hopes to create its own "Green Wall Street", where businesses from around the world can come to invest in environmental action....

Introduced a livestock geneticist to a fisheries manager today. The former is helping farmers make evidence-based decisions about herd breeding under climate change. The latter is faced with functional extinctions & the likelihood they’ll have to pool survivors to save species.

Sep 1

Wattle Day. One of the few dedicated to a key aspect of the environment. Hope you enjoyed it. Maybe plant a few local ones so you can enjoy them in future years.

Aug 31

Several members of our research team spoke the National Wild Dog Action Plan meeting today. Thanks for the invitation to share some of our #science with a range of stakeholders in #dingo management.

Aug 30

If we don’t provide adequate financial support for Uni students we can’t expect them to be on campus. In turn, we can’t expect them to reach their full potential. Ultimately we will all get the professionals we don’t pay for.

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Prof Jan Slapeta

@JanSlapeta

· Aug 29

Should I be shocked again? 1pm lecture - no one! I lectured empty chairs. 10 min in a student that was early for 2pm lecture showed up (completely unrelated subject different degree). We had a great discussion and I had one keen student learning. Where from now? Help @Sydney_Uni

‘Utterly damning’ review finds offsets scheme fails to protect NSW environment

Aug 30

“90% of offset sites under the scheme were not being monitored to ensure the required environmental benefits were being delivered.” Make users pay for monitoring. Ensure the monitoring is independent and rigorous.

Offsets scheme fails to protect NSW environment | Environment | The Guardian

theguardian.com

Conservationists label report ‘utterly damning’ as opposition and crossbench MPs call for overhaul of state’s biodiversity market

In reality, this probably means spending 10+ times the current investment. A pittance in the light of subsidies given to companies to destroy our environment. Imagine funding demolition of perfectly good homes in a housing crisis; we’re doing that now with our environment.

Wildlife management is nuanced. Tailoring responses to local needs is important. We can only do this if management and the underpinning science is well funded. This means investing in ecology, community engagement and the development of new management tools.

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Professor Euan Ritchie

@EuanRitchie1

· Aug 29

Crocodiles, sharks, dingoes…surely we can do better than culls, lethal ‘control’ and killing ‘problem individual’ native apex predators in Australia?

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Aug 29

Mice, rats, rabbits, hares, foxes, cats, deer, goats, pigs, deer, horses, buffalo… there remains a vital role for lethal wildlife management in Australia but we must develop other options too. twitter.com/EuanRitchie1/s

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Aug 29

An absolute travesty. Conservation costs money and it’s worth it. ‘This endangered marsupial is disappearing from one of its last remaining wild habitats’

This endangered marsupial is disappearing from one of its last remaining wild habitats

With only about 1,000 northern bettongs remaining in the wild, conservationists race to construct a feral-animal-free zone to rebuild the marsupials' numbers.

Aug 28

What an incredible killing machine. No wonder our wildlife stand little chance.

WARNING: Image of dead* #feralcat in thread. If you’ve never seen a #cat without it’s skin, this shows why they are such formidable predators. *This animal was killed humanely as per animal ethics approval.

#Science. It’s real.

Three years ago we feared what we thought was the worst (#fires) but the reality was more devastating. Hazard reduction burns like this could not stop the whole area burning soon after. We’ll soon have as much ‘after’-fire monitoring data as ‘before’. Could be interesting.

Bureaucrats pushed for swift parrot recovery plan to be changed to play down logging threat

Aug 25

Trade-offs between industry and conservation should be argued in plain view, not in ‘back rooms’. ‘Bureaucrats pushed for swift parrot recovery plan to be changed to play down logging threat’ | Environment | The Guardian

theguardian.com

Exclusive: Revisions revealed through FOI are more focused on protecting forestry industry than preventing species going extinct, scientists argue

Aug 25

Australia loves an underdog and this time it was a #bat 🦇 and not a #dingo 🐕 #AusMammalOfTheYear

Aug 24

Wasn’t me. Promise. #keepyourcatsinside #trapneutercontain

The Southern bent-wing bat is the 2022 Australian Mammal of the Year #amoty2022

Aug 24

#dingo skulls. Each animal wandered the local gorge country before meeting its fate at the base of an old gum tree. This collection is the legacy of a trapper once employed to protect calves in what is now National Park.

It’s Hovea time!

Let’s call it a draw. Mammal of the Year Final: #Dingo VS Southern Bent-Wing #Bat

cosmosmagazine.com

After an intense 6 weeks of voting, we can finally crown the critically endangered southern bent-winged bat as Australian Mammal of the Year for 2022!

Aug 21

It would be ideal to regulate large corporations better but the notion of absolving individuals of personal responsibility for environmental impact is a bad idea. ‘Have we been duped into believing environmental blame rests with us?’

Avoiding plastics and using a reusable coffee cup to save the environment? Maybe you've been duped

It's big businesses, not individuals, that need to change if we are to address environmental issues.This author says clever marketing has made us think otherwise.

Aug 21

Seems many people use ‘must’ when they mean ‘I think we should’. If your timeline is like mine it won’t take long to find examples.

Aug 19

One of the most worrying phrases to hear from a land manager is ‘We just have to meet our burn targets’. How much habitat is burned at ‘inopportune’ times to meet political targets?

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ABC News

@abcnews

· Aug 19

'Burn above all else': WA's bushfire mitigation strategy criticised by scientists abc.net.au/news/2022-08-2

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Aug 18

Typical ride home. Always try hard to keep out of drivers’ ways but one still managed to take offence and swerve at me on the entrance to a roundabout. Very nearly got me too.

Aug 17

Sad but unsurprising. It takes everyone’s effort to make workplaces safe spaces. “Country women more likely to 'grin and bear' workplace harassment”

Country women more likely to 'grin and bear' workplace harassment, researcher says

Amid scrutiny of the mining industry, an expert says harassment happens in almost every sector, and that rural women are especially vulnerable.

Aug 17

Sundews are enjoying the extraordinarily wet conditions locally.

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De-extinction: scientists are planning the multimillion-dollar resurrection of the Tasmanian tiger

Aug 16

Thylacine 2.0 will be zoo exhibits and pets of the rich long before (if?) they ever return to the wild.

theguardian.com

University of Melbourne partners with US biotech company to plan genetic restoration of the thylacine