confronting crises in conservation:a talk on the wild...

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Confronting crises in conservation: a talk on the wild side Michael Archer Australian Museum, 6 College Street, Sydney NSW 2010 School of Biological Science, University of New South Wales NSW 2052 ABSTRACT Conservation of the Australian biota and rural and regional communities is at a critical crossroads and our generation is at the wheel.Three to five billion dollars in land degradation is accumulating every year,more species are going extinct here than on any other continent in the world and rural Australia is struggling with deepening cultural/economic crises about long-term viability. The perspective from deep time suggests that our current limited range of strategies for solving these crises, including reliance on the effectiveness of protected areas, will ultimately fail—sometimes catastrophically. Environ- mental and economic necessity urges us to consider all potential strategies that could turn this around, whether or not they fly in the face of conservative or minority group prejudices. Sustainable use of native wildlife, in urban as well as rural Australia, has the potential to increase the capacity for long-term effective conservation of the biota and rural and regional Australia, as it now does in other areas of the world such as southern Africa and as it once did in Australia when Indigenous people managed this continent. It may well offend animal rights advocates and environmental conservatives to suggest that valued wildlife could be the only alternative to no wildlife, but if that is the choice then there is no choice. The time has come to stand up to irrational views if they put at risk the long-term future of the natural and cultural things we value. Long-term conservation of the biota and rural and regional Australia requires that we trial new and potentially more effective ways of putting people and environments back together for the mutual benefit of both.This document overviews imperatives for change, potential if challenging initiatives that could assist traditional efforts and suggestions about how they might be translated into action. Pages 12 - 52 in A Zoological Revolution. Using native fauna to assist in its own survival. Edited by Daniel Lunney and Chris Dickman, 2002. Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales, Mosman 2088 and Australian Museum. Introduction ‘Things have got to change’ has become a universal mantra as we enter the third millennium increasingly worried about the ability of these things to survive into the fourth. Our ancestors spent the first two chewing off the umbilical cord of dependence on their gardens of Eden—stable, diverse ecosystems which they spurned, burned and turned into fragile monocultures that enabled rapid growth in human populations. By the beginning of the third millennium, unease had rapidly grown about the long-term survival capacity of growth spiral economies, fueled by awareness in the rate of decline in natural environments and in particular natural resources required for our own survival. Sector-specific reviews such as Ecologically sustainable development working groups; final report—Agriculture (Anon., 1991) and Agriculture and the environmental imperative (Pratley & Robertson 1998), continent-wide reports such as Australia: State of the Environment 1996 & 2001 and long-term overviews such as From plesiosaurs to people: 100 million years of Australian environmental history (Archer et al. 1998) challenge presumptions that what we are doing now will be sustainable in the long run. We continue to deplete Australia’s natural capital faster than it can regenerate, a suicidal strategy for any economic manager. This is not to say that the often Herculean efforts by many groups, government agencies, NGOs and individuals (see below), to maximise the effectiveness of traditional conservation

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Page 1: Confronting crises in conservation:a talk on the wild …media.longnow.org/files/2/REVIVE/Confronting crises in conservation...Confronting crises in conservation:a talk on the wild

Confronting crises in conservation: atalk on the wild sideMichael ArcherAustralian Museum, 6 College Street, Sydney NSW 2010School of Biological Science, University of New South Wales NSW 2052

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Conservation of the Australian biota and rural and regional communities is ata critical crossroads and our generation is at the wheel.Three to five billiondollars in land degradation is accumulating every year, more species are goingextinct here than on any other continent in the world and rural Australia isstruggling with deepening cultural/economic crises about long-term viability.The perspective from deep time suggests that our current limited range ofstrategies for solving these crises, including reliance on the effectiveness ofprotected areas, will ultimately fail—sometimes catastrophically. Environ-mental and economic necessity urges us to consider all potential strategiesthat could turn this around,whether or not they fly in the face of conservativeor minority group prejudices. Sustainable use of native wildlife, in urban as wellas rural Australia, has the potential to increase the capacity for long-termeffective conservation of the biota and rural and regional Australia, as it nowdoes in other areas of the world such as southern Africa and as it once did inAustralia when Indigenous people managed this continent. It may well offendanimal rights advocates and environmental conservatives to suggest thatvalued wildlife could be the only alternative to no wildlife, but if that is thechoice then there is no choice.The time has come to stand up to irrationalviews if they put at risk the long-term future of the natural and cultural thingswe value. Long-term conservation of the biota and rural and regional Australiarequires that we trial new and potentially more effective ways of puttingpeople and environments back together for the mutual benefit of both.Thisdocument overviews imperatives for change, potential if challenging initiativesthat could assist traditional efforts and suggestions about how they might betranslated into action.

Pages 12 - 52 in A Zoological Revolution. Using native fauna to assist in its own survival. Edited by Daniel Lunney and Chris Dickman, 2002. Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales, Mosman 2088 and Australian Museum.

Introduction‘Things have got to change’ has become auniversal mantra as we enter the thirdmillennium increasingly worried about the abilityof these things to survive into the fourth. Ourancestors spent the first two chewing off theumbilical cord of dependence on their gardens ofEden—stable, diverse ecosystems which theyspurned, burned and turned into fragilemonocultures that enabled rapid growth inhuman populations. By the beginning of the thirdmillennium, unease had rapidly grown about thelong-term survival capacity of growth spiraleconomies, fueled by awareness in the rate ofdecline in natural environments and in particularnatural resources required for our own survival.Sector-specific reviews such as Ecologically

sustainable development working groups; finalreport—Agriculture (Anon., 1991) andAgriculture and the environmental imperative(Pratley & Robertson 1998), continent-widereports such as Australia: State of the Environment1996 & 2001 and long-term overviews such asFrom plesiosaurs to people: 100 million years ofAustralian environmental history (Archer et al.1998) challenge presumptions that what we aredoing now will be sustainable in the long run. Wecontinue to deplete Australia’s natural capitalfaster than it can regenerate, a suicidal strategyfor any economic manager.This is not to say that the often Herculean effortsby many groups, government agencies, NGOsand individuals (see below), to maximise theeffectiveness of traditional conservation

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strategies, from the 1970s to the present, has inany way been a waste of time or inappropriateeffort—quite the contrary. They have beenessential in holding back the tidal wave ofunsustainable, short-term financial gainstrategies focused on the natural world. Examplesinclude the commitments by individuals andorganisations, risking their necks and/or theirjobs in the process, to save threatened habitats,link isolated parts of ecosystems via corridors intolarger, more viable entities, and frustrate effortsthat would result in destruction of old-growthforests. The gains many dedicated conservationgroups and individuals such as Bob Brown havemade in ‘holding the line’ deserve Nobel Prizesfor Environmental Protection. My focus here,however, is not on the good things that havebeen done up to this point; it is on what musthappen from this point forward if those essentialgains are not to have been made in vain. On theirown, as critical as they have been in keepingecosystems alive, they cannot ensure the futurefor those ecosystems or the communities onwhich those ecosystems now depend. The heart of the problem is the rapidly-growinghuman population on planet Earth and itsincreasing per capita demand for resources(Ehrlich & Ehrlich 1996, Ehrlich et al. 1995).

The State of World Population 2001 reportFootprints and milestones: population andenvironmental change, released by the UnitedNations Population Fund reported that morepeople are using more resources with moreintensity and leaving a bigger ‘footprint’ on theEarth than ever before. Having doubled to 6.1billion people since 1960, it predicts a furtherincrease in world population to 9.3 billion by2050 with corresponding negative impacts onenvironments. Despite the ravages of disease andregional acceptance of the need for birth control,global population grows in most countrieswithout plan. So long as religious beliefs andignorance obstruct birth control, the situationwill get worse. (Fig. 1.)In Australia’s case, we need to develop ascientifically-credible population policy based onecological sustainability issues (Jones 2000, 2001)or accept that no lasting solutions to ourenvironmental crises are going to work. Althoughcurrent ‘guesstimates’ range from 1 to 50 million,we have a good indication of how many humanscannot be ecologically sustained, maintaining ourstandard of living. Considering the high andincreasing land degradation costs Australia sufferswith 19 million people, it can be argued that weare already significantly over-populated.

Fig. 1. The underpinning cause of most environmental abuse and failure to conserve is the growing populationof Humans, both here and overseas. Australia, with 19 million people, may already be unsustainablyoverpopulated. (Courtesy Nature Focus and Nature Australia).

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Although it is not just a question of populationsize but also of how that population is distributedand how it uses the land to produce a particularstandard of living, it is with the former issue thatthis issues paper is primarily concerned. And it isnot a constant number that Australia has to beable to support because its population size israpidly increasing. Recent figures for Sydney, forexample, demonstrate that it is growing fasternow than it has in the last eight years and isexpected to reach 4.5 million by 2013, eight yearsahead of schedule (Humphries 2001). The constantly increasing needs of our growingpopulation have led to land clearance which isoccurring at rates recently found to be far higherthan previously thought—688 km2/year or theequivalent of 50 football fields every hour), soilerosion, rising water tables, salinisation,desertification, plagues of introduced species,simplification of ecosystems, eutrophication ofwater resources, death of once great riversystems, globally-shocking rates of extinction andother losses—currently adding up to a $3-5billion land degradation cost that adds each yearto an accumulating overall land damage deficit ofat least $60 billion. We are driving ourselves andAustralia into this environmental black hole bydestroying the natural capital of the land. Add to

this the as yet immeasurable impact of climatechange on the whole of the continent and ourchildren have, on current projections, not a lot intheir future to smile about. (Fig. 2.)Land damage has been exacerbated by financialand humanitarian incentives to feed 50 millionpeople offshore in addition to the 19 millionresident in Australia. Many would argue,accordingly, the wisdom of producing enoughfood to sustainably feed Australians and nomore, thereby cutting down on food productionand land damage by perhaps 71%. Thisproposition, however, which focuses on thewelfare of the environment, does not addressthe triple bottom line critical in arguments ofthis kind. It ignores the rural/regionalAustralian communities and the economicconsequences that such a cut-back would have.These communities depend on the income fromexports to survive and produce the food neededby 19 million Australians. As long as thosecommunities exist and are important to us, theirneeds and capacities have to be factored intoany overall strategy that is going to work.Further, as suggested below, the needs of thosecommunities may be the key to developing moreeffective ways of increasing the conservationcapacity of private land. (Fig. 3.)

Fig. 2. The once thriving town of Eucla,Western Australia—now a desert.We need to confront and turn arounda legacy of land degradation that accumulates to the tune of about $5 billion per year. (M. Archer).

Archer

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For years I added my voice and writings to those ofother Australians worried about the effectiveness oftraditional conservation strategies andcommitments. But because focusing on the doomand gloom of the past and present does little morethan depress people who should otherwise beacting to change things, I’ve thrown my lot in withoptimists who know it is critically important toovercome conservative reaction, to conceive newinitiatives that could increase effective long-termconservation not only of the biota, but of rural andregional Australia as well. Many of these futuristscontributed to the landmark publication Conserv-ation through sustainable use of wildlife (Grigg, Hale& Lunney 1995) and maintain their commitment.That vital publication was the clarion call for the‘revolution’ we continue to explore here.Not surprisingly, suggestions for trials of non-traditional strategies provoke antagonism fromsome conservative groups. Much of thisantagonism is based on presumed or imaginedproblems or the logical error of false dichotomy—i.e., the presumption that of two solutions to aproblem, only one can be appropriate. I am toldby some, for example, that my view that we needto value wildlife to increase our commitment toits future actually means I am suggesting we

abandon protected area strategies—which is anabsurd non-sequitor. My focus is on theimportance of trialing compatible conservationstrategies that will act synergistically to increasethe likelihood of achieving the overall goal.Protected area strategies, like ecotourism andother ongoing conservation programs, areessential sine qua non strategies that need to beaugmented, not replaced. Similarly, in promotingthe conservation and economic propriety ofsustainably harvesting kangaroos, it is silly tosuggest, as some do, that I am therefore alsoarguing that consumptive use is all we should dowith kangaroos, or that we should abandonharvesting sheep, cattle and other introducedspecies. My argument is that sustainableharvesting of kangaroos on sheep- and cattle-properties can value-add to other conservationand rural and regional strategies. Arguments thatwe should trial native animals as companionssimilarly does not mean I am suggesting weabandon keeping Cats and Dogs. Decisions aboutwhich strategies are followed needs to be a matterfor personal choice within the range of legitimateoptions. What I am trying to do is encourage abroadening of the range of options that mightbenefit the biota and rural and regional Australia.

Fig. 3. The major use of private land in Australia is Agriculture which consumes and to one degree or anotherunsustainably degrades 65-70% of the continent. (Courtesy Nature Focus and Nature Australia).

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It is my intention here to present an issuespaper, not a technical treatise on these topics.Many of the papers appearing alongside this onewere generated partly in response to these issueswhich I and others before me have raised foryears and which more recently have becometopics of sustained public interest. So while thependulum of public interest and politicalcommitment seems to be sticking closer to therational side of its range, I want to spread theseissues out for wider consideration.

Challenges to conservation fromthe perspective of deep timeResearch that our palaeontological team hasconducted over the last 25 years into theprehistory of Australia’s lineages and naturalenvironments has involved some 80 colleagues in26 institutions and 11 countries. It is giving us anincreasingly better grip on the importance of deeptime understanding to provide key insights intoconservation issues. By deep time, I mean aperspective framed in millennia and/or millions ofyears, rather than the brief two centuries and a bitsince European colonisation of Australia. Ideally,we should anticipate change as far forward as weare able to document in retrospect. The furtherback in time we comprehend, the further forward

we can anticipate, wisdom advocated by manyhistorians and biologists. Developing effectivestrategies for environmental sustainability requiresknowledge about processes such as evolution,geological cycles and greenhouse/icehouseclimatic cycles (e.g., as overviewed in McGowranet al. 2001) that converted the past into thepresent because these processes will continue toshape the future. (Fig. 4.)

Fig. 4. The Riversleigh World Heritage property: source for conservation information in ‘deep time’. A,excavations at Wayne’s Wok Site, one of hundreds of sites producing faunas collectively spanning the last 25million years of Australian history (S. Hand). B, Acid-processing a large block of fossil-rich limestone (M. Archer).C, Fox-size thylacine skeleton emerging from a middle Miocene block of cave limestone (A. Gillespie).

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Key points relevant to conservation that havecome out of our research and that of otherpalaeontologists, biogeographers, evolutionistsand conservationists who operate with a deeptime perspective, have been documented in othercontexts (Archer et al. 1992, 1994a, 1994b, 1995,1997, 1998, 1999a,b). While we have pioneeredthis view in Australia, others elsewhere aresimilarly exploring the importance ofpalaeontological data for conservation (e.g.,Delcourt & Delcourt 1998, Graham et al. 1996,Houston & Schreiner 1995, Jackson & Overpeck2000, Knudson 1999, McDonald & Chure 2001,Swetham et al. 1999). Key among lessons from the past is the fact thateffective long-term conservation requires speciesoriginations to, on balance, off-set or exceedextinctions. Long-term capacity of evolution toproduce these off-sets, although circumstance-and group-specific, appears for mammals torequire areas about 300,000 km2 or larger. Islandsat the lower end of this range with demonstratedlong-term viability include New Guinea, Borneoand Madagascar. Islands smaller than this rarely if ever demonstrate long-term lineageconservation—at least for mammals. By lineagesI mean endemic taxa at family-level (or above)such as wombats, dasyures, feather-tail possumsor horses. Smaller islands can conserve endemic

genera and species but for periods on averageproportional to island area—the smaller theisland, the shorter the period. This is because therisks of lineage death and or ecosystem collapsefrom environmental disasters is, on average,inversely proportional to the size of the area.Because protected areas (reserves, parks etc.) areislands within a sea of alienated (usuallyagricultural) land, they need to be large andresilient enough for effective long-termconservation. In Australia, as in most areas of theworld, individual protected areas appear to beorders of magnitude too small for effective long-term conservation of mammals. The largestprotected area in Australia established to provideconservation for lineages of distinctive Australianmammals is Kakadu at about 19,000 km2. This isapproximately the same size as New Caledoniawhich, although colonised from time to time bylineages of large distinctive vertebrates, inevitablyloses them to extinction. It is also the same size asthe area of bushland destroyed in one Australianfire, the 1939 Black Friday bushfire in Victoria.Clearly, as with oceanic islands, all other thingsbeing equal, the risks to the future of a land-lockedreserve are going to be inversely proportional to itssize. Environmental disasters are going to wipe outthe conservation capacity of small reserves morefrequently and more profoundly than large

Fig. 4. D, Reconstruction of part of the biodiversity that would have characterised Riversleigh in the earlyMiocene about 23 Ma ago (Archer et al. 1994b; courtesy New Holland Press).

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reserves. While not certain that the first signs ofdisaster are already being seen in Kakadu, initialreports of worrying faunal declines (Braithwaite &Muller 1997) have been followed by moresubstantial evidence for serious long-term declines(Woinarski et al. 2001). (Fig. 5.)Add to the risks of fire and other catastrophicevents that can instantaneously obliterate theconservation capacity of small reserves, growingconcern about geographic shifts in the climaticconditions required to maintain particularecosystems incarcerated in ‘island’ reserves, andeven the largest reserves such as Kakadu become inthe long term little more than short-term refugesheaded for inevitable obliteration. The Wet Tropicsrainforests of the Atherton Tableland innortheastern Queensland formerly survived severeclimate change by being able to ‘migrate’ eastwardsduring the height of the last arid phase about 18,000years ago. When a similar or equally profoundclimate change occurs in the future, these greatforests with their unique animals will have nowhereto go being surrounded on all sides by agriculture—we have stolen their ability to survive changedespite declaring them to have protected status.For effective long-term conservation of each ofthe five major terrestrial habitat types in

Australia (e.g., rainforest, sclerophyll forest,woodlands, grasslands/deserts, wetlands), eachwould need on average about 300,000 km2 whichadds up to 20% of Australia (1.5 million km2). Atpresent, there is little more than 7.8% inprotected areas (fide Environment Australia2000; and Anon. 2000a) established for thepurposes of conservation.Finally, there is the ‘health’ of rural and regionalAustralia in terms of its people and communities.This is not the forum to discuss the scale or detailof these problems but broadly they echo theenvironmental situation: overall decreasingyields/ha of valued products as land degradationtakes its toll; significant net increase over the lastfew decades in the amount of financial inputnecessary to get every dollar out of agriculture;growing risks, demonstrated globally, ofcatastrophic disease in crops and stock; globalcompetition and unpredictable market-drivenchanges in crop/stock value; loss of commitmentand abandonment of properties as debts climband future prospects dim; and decline in self-esteem as accumulating damage to the land isincreasingly blamed on agriculture. Consequentdecline in rural/regional communities as a wholeis something media-informed Australians seem tohave accepted as inevitable and unavoidable.

Fig.5.Our protected areas, important in their own right, are not large enough to ensure a future for mammal lineages—hence they are more appropriately described as preservation than conservation areas. (Courtesy Gary Larson).

Archer

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Valuing wildlife—an ancient andsuccessful conservation strategyWe respond to claims of environmental degradationeither by denying these are serious issues, resigningourselves to inevitable loss, crossing our fingers inthe hope that someone else will come up with amiracle fix, or fiercely determining to roll up thesleeves and join with other like-minded activists toturn things around. In the long run, none but thelast will solve problems.Already many groups share this fiercedetermination to do something positive aboutconservation including a wide range of governmentand non-government organisations. These include(there are many others) Environment Australia,Landcare, Bushcare, World Wildlife Fund, PlanetArk, Australian Conservation Foundation,Farmers Federation of Australia, National Parks atthe State and Federal levels, National Parksfoundations, Murray Darling Basin Commission,CSIRO, many university research programs andconservation centres, Royal Botanic Gardens,Australian Museum, land and water conservationagencies, Royal Zoological Society of New SouthWales, Kangaroo Industry Association of Australia,Linnean Society of New South Wales, AustralianMammal Society, Biosphere Reserves, NatureConservancy, Earth Sanctuaries Limited, Revive,private research groups, community groups such asWIRES, Frog and Tadpole Study Group, the BilbySociety, bush regenerators and fortunately many,many others. Collectively, these have hadwonderful successes in tackling specific problemsand engaging the energies of thousands whounderstand the urgency of the situation and wantto help. These groups must continue to operatebecause each is contributing to the overall goal ofconservation of either the biota and/or rural andregional Australia. They are all promotingcompatible, conservation-focused initiatives.However, as vital as they are, these efforts inthemselves will not be enough or in time. We mustfind ways to significantly increase the amount ofland with conservation capacity. It is, however, mostunlikely and I think inappropriate that another 12%of Australia, the amount required to haveconservation capacity beyond the 7.8% currently inprotected areas, would be resumed from privateownership. In any case, resumption wouldexacerbate the economic/social problems of ruraland regional Australia. For this reason, this extraconservation-capable land must be establishedthrough multiple use of existing private land that is‘healed’ if necessary through restoration.

Here is where the major part of the zoologicalrevolution required must take place—on privateland, driven by private land owners working withadvisory bodies that draw on all of the best, mostfar-sighted and in some cases bravest strategiesavailable, looking for win/win solutions. To methe key change that must occur is to recognisethe multifaceted value of native resources andthat we can sustainably utilise specific resourcesto value-add to rural and regional incomes and inthe process increase the conservation capacity ofthat same land. In its most generic sense, there is nothing newabout a focus on sustainable use of valuednative resources. In the first place, it is whatdistinguishes the mindset of hunter-gatherersfrom that of the farmers—European colonistswho cleared or damaged the native bushbecause they did not value it and introduced tomore than 65% of the continent monoculturesof non-Australian species which they did value.In Hugh Brody’s view (Brody 2001), it is oursouthern Eurasian ancestors, the wheat-, cow-,pig-, goat- and sheep-farmers—not theindigenous hunter-gatherers—who are actuallynomads because we over-populate using theagricultural surpluses we produce, damage landin the process, then wage wars on neighbours totake their land in order to continue to over-populate, and on it goes. But it is not adinfinitum because the amount of arable land isfinite. And behind us abused land accumulatesin a way that it would not have done whenmanaged by the indigenous occupants of thisland who valued, used and depended on itsnatural resources. Allowing the reality of theroots of modern agriculture and domesticationhaving started in southern Eurasia (Diamond1999), it is nevertheless interesting to speculateabout the different global attitudes that mightnow hold sway if Australian Indigenous peopleshad invaded England rather than vice versa—introducing kangaroos, emus and wattle seed tobe farmed in an England they clearedaccordingly of its unseemly native animals andvegetation. Of course, early English settlers didmore or less the same thing to the original biotaof England such that now the bulk of wildmammals that occur there are rabbits whichwere introduced to England. Native Englishspecies struggle to survive. Still, had historytaken a different turn, they might now becombating plagues of brushtail possums andwombat warrens undermining their castles.

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In the case of Australia, there are some whoargue (e.g., Jones 1968, Merrilees 1968, Flannery1990, 1994, Roberts et al. 2001) that the firstpeoples into Australia blitzkrieged the biota,exterminating its unique megafauna by about46,000 years ago, possibly within 1000 years ofthe arrival of humans. This view is not universaland increasingly challenged (e.g., Field &Dodson 1999, Wroe & Field 2001). As moresubstantial evidence accumulates spanning thecritical interval from 100,000-20,000 years ago,there is increasing evidence that humans and themegafauna in Australia overlapped by up to25,000 or more years making climate changeand/or a combination of factors (some probablyanthropogenic) more likely than blitzkrieg as thecause for the late Pleistocene pulse of megafaunalextinction. Some megafauna, however, stillsurvive in the form of Red, Grey and Eurokangaroos, Emus and Cassowaries.This side of 35,000 years, however, most agreethat the land management practices ofIndigenous Australians, deliberately orinadvertently, secured hundreds of distinctivespecies of mammals many of which they valued,particularly as food and clothing, and sustainablyutilised. In stark contrast, more than 30 of thesewent extinct or drastically declined withindecades of the arrival of Europeans. Put into aglobal context, of the 60 species of mammals thathave gone extinct throughout the world in thelast 500 years, a third have been from Australiawithin the last 200 years. In New South Walesalone, 77 (59%) of the 130 mammals originallyknown to have occurred in this State are nowclassified as Threatened and 27 (21%) areExtinct. The precise reasons are the subject ofconstant debate. Beale & Fray (1990), Brody

(2001), Dickman (1993), Flannery (1994), Rolls(2000), Rifkin (1991), Low (1999), White(1997) and many others lay almost all of theblame at the feet of European land-clearing andintroduction of non-Australian species. Lunney(2001) makes a particularly strong case that in atleast the Western Division of New South Wales,the primary cause of the extinction of mammalswas the introduction and spread of Sheep.

Fig. 6. Conflict continues about who or what killed most of Australia’s megafauna during the late Pleistocene.Some have argued for ‘blitzkrieg’ by early Humans but this view is under challenge. (Courtesy Colin Stahel fromArcher & Clayton 1984).

Fig. 7. Europeans have been responsible for theextinction of many species that Indigenous Australianslived with for at least 60,000 years, including theTasmanian Thylacine.

Archer

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To me, there is an important message here aboutthe valuing system of Indigenous people inAustralia—it worked until the arrival ofEuropeans. While some have suggested thattraditional Indigenous culture is an anachronismmost appropriately studied in books and asartifacts in museums because its time has passed(e.g., Sandall 2001), I would suggest that it hasnever been more timely and relevant than rightnow as a range of dynamic conservationstrategies. Whatever remains of that valuingsystem should be revitalised and put back intopractice before more species are lost. In terms ofspecific Indigenous land management practicessuch as patch-burning, its importance forconservation is now widely accepted. Similarly,the intrinsic value of Australian biodiversity fornatural and cultural systems, continues to berecognised through ecotourism. We are alsobecoming very interested in the economic andhuman health benefits that could derive from thegenetic capital of native plants (e.g., Beattie &Ehrlich 2001). What is less widely recognised oraccepted is the enormous potential for furtherconservation and cultural gains that could (and Iwould argue must) be achieved throughsustainable harvesting and other uses ofappropriate native species—back to basics.

The second reason a focus on sustainable use ofnative resources reflects a view that is beingincreasingly advocated by conservationistsfrustrated by the failure of traditional strategiesalone to conserve species and, in particular, tocommit local communities to their conservation.Webb (1995) makes a very sound case for ‘CSU’,conservation through sustainable use. This viewis also advocated by Sir Martin Holdgate asDirector General of the IUCN (Holdgate 1992,1996) and many others including McNeely(1988), Armstrong & Abbott (1995), Asafu-Adjaye (1995), Choquenot et al. (1995), Damm(in press), Davis (1995), King (1995), Wilson(1987) as well as by international, national andstate authorities (see below).

Multifacets on the gem of ‘value’The key to increasing success is to recognise thatreliance on one strategy alone, no matter howvenerable, will not achieve the goal ofconservation. In our western agricultural view,the strategy most venerated is that ofestablishment of protected areas. Over the last200 years, that has meant setting aside a chunk ofland, commonly too steep to plough, rocky or

deficient in some way that makes it unsuitable foragriculture, building a fence around it, and thendedicating the surrounding ‘useful’ land tofarming monocultures of introduced species (e.g.,Pressey 1995; Lunney et al. 1997). The result isminuscule, non-sustainable islands of naturalecosystems within a sea of ‘de-natured’,degenerating land. In contrast, the likelihood of winning the ‘game’of conservation will be increased by use ofmultiple, compatible strategies—like the game ofgolf. Committing to just one kind of club is a sureprescription for failure; success urges a repertoireof compatible tools because the challenges facedwill not all be the same.I presume that conservation capacity, at least on ashort-term basis, of managed protected areas issomething we can more or less take for granted.This is not necessarily the view of someorganisations such as Earth Sanctuaries whichargue that traditional protected areas havereduced effectiveness because they retainintroduced predators, but for me this is not thepoint. The point is that there is not remotelyenough land for effective long-term conservationin all of the protected areas combined no matterwhat management strategy they employ. So theissue of the value of multiple conservationstrategies needs to be focused first on privateland—land managed in most cases for agriculture. Considering private land, there are two mainkinds presenting different opportunities: urbanland, within and adjacent to cities; and ruralland. While the amount of urban land isrelatively minuscule, it is where most of us liveand hence is important in shaping attitudes andnurturing commitment. It is also the coastal landand many conservation strategies now also focuson the increasingly urbanised coastal strip fromMaroubra to Manly and beyond. I am not thefirst to argue that we desperately need tointegrate the two to whatever extent we can.Strategically planned corridors of naturalenvironment woven through suburbs, linkingbackyards to the bush, would do enormous goodby introducing native bush-dwellers to humancity-dwellers. Wildlife could wander through orestablish in cities, making friends and converts tothe notion that they have value and henceshould be conserved. Integrated backyards withsustainable populations of wildlife would be asource of neighbourhood pride. Local Councils,assisted by Government, could reduce the ratesof targeted families who agreed to commit their

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backyards to native vegetation to create thecorridors that made this possible. Backyard bushponds where residents could swim with frogs andturtles could replace the environmental horrorand expense of chlorine-poisoned giant bathtubs.Already there are many companies (e.g.,Enviroswim) which could manage theenvironmental safety and health of such pondswithout the use of chlorine. Houses could bebuilt (as sensibly suggested to me by NickMooney) to incorporate ceiling to floor one-wayglass ‘terraria’ that enabled residents to watchreal possums play, mate and raise young ratherthan ‘Big Brother’ on TV. Perhaps mostcontroversially, we could open the back door andlet the wildlife in—either as visitors or nativecompanions (more about this below). Potentialopportunities for integrating the wildlife of thebush with the wild life of the city are limited onlyby imagination or legislation. When it comes to rural private land, however,opportunities for innovative conservationstrategies are far greater. I accept and endorse allof the ongoing strategies such as those promotedby Landcare (one in three farmers is a memberof a Landcare group), Bushcare, WWF, EarthSanctuaries and other Government and non-government organisations focused on

conservation initiatives. Similarly, the verybright initiatives for bioregional planning andcommons-type cooperatives which are the focusof David Brunckhorst’s research (e.g.,Brunckhorst 2000) are wonderful shifts in apositive direction. All of these programsincrease the capacity for conservation. Initiatives focused on ecotourism are among themost important because they are driven andmaintained by economic incentives both for thelandowner and for the entrepreneurial manager.These have proved to be very successful incentivesfor conservation in Africa, Asia, North and SouthAmerica and, to a lesser extent, Australia. Theextent to which ecotourism occurs on private asopposed to protected land varies with, e.g., moreprivate African than Australian wildlifesanctuaries involved. Also relevant, however, areecotourism’s potential negative impacts onenvironments involved. At a symposium inPretoria in 2000 on the conservation benefits ofutilising wildlife, several presenters acknowledgedthat long-term ecotourism had led toenvironmental problems because of increasedtourist access and consequent damage to fragilelands and reproductive life cycles for iconic speciessuch as Lions and Cheetahs, disruptive processesthat had resulted in cubs being starved. One

Fig. 8. Private and public urban areas need livingbridges to lead wildlife into our cities and our minds.Cities have often been described as places whereafter all the trees have been removed we namestreets after them. (Courtesy Gahan Wilson).

Fig. 8b. Filling our urban gardens with native ratherthan introduced plants cuts down water and fertiliseruse, helps intergrate the bush and the cities andintroduces Australians to the beauty and value ofAustralian plants. (M. Archer)

Archer

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comment was that ecotourism vehicles left tracksand ruts that were visible for years and turnedKenya’s Amboseli National Park into a Disneylandduring the tourist high season (Damm, in press). Despite these concerns, overall experience suggeststhat environmentally-managed ecotourism shouldbe tallied as a generally positive initiative for long-term conservation. This is the view sensiblypromoted by Dave Croft (1999, 2000) and others(e.g., Braithwaite 2002, this forum) focused on thetourism industry. Suggestions that this is the onlyappropriate form of wildlife use, particularly onprivate lands, however, should be treated withsome skepticism. Because Australian animals areon average smaller and less awesome than those inAfrica, and most are predominantly nocturnal,ecotourism interest in Australian mammals at leastis likely to benefit a far more limited proportion ofthe rural/regional community than it does inAfrica. It is questionable how many ecotouristswould be willing to spend serious money to watchthree or four kinds of conspicuous kangaroos sit inthe shade under a tree. Nevertheless, it is a benefitand should be promoted. These relatively non-controversial, compatibleconservation strategies are not, however, the onlyones that should be on the table for consideration.Harkening back to Indigenous strategies that havelong-term conservation benefits, both here andoverseas, we should also be exploring the potentialadvantages of sustainably harvesting, hunting andperhaps even farming of native wildlife. As Brechinet al. (2001), Beale (1999), Damm (in press) andothers have pointed out, reliance on protected areastrategies is not having the wins globally and inAustralia that advocates expected—to do better,we need to explore innovative, compatibleinitiatives that could increase the conservationcapacity of private land.

Sustainable harvests of valueSustainable harvesting of native species for food,medicine and other valued products has beenpractised continuously by Indigenous peoples forthousands of years and by Europeans on and offfor centuries. The modern focus in Australia onthis strategy as a way of increasing effectiveconservation achieved through other means hasbeen pioneered by many since the 1970s.Grahame Webb in particular has promoted andput into practice sustainable harvesting programsfocused on native species. Webb (1995) notesthat ‘CSU’, conservation through sustainableuse, is ‘…just another conservation strategy—an

additional tool that can be used by wildlifemanagers to solve wildlife conservation problems.It is particularly well-suited to enhancingconservation on private or communal landsoutside of national parks, reserves and protectedareas’. The significance of this is that 95% of theland surface of Australia and the rest of the worldis not in parks, reserves or other kinds ofprotected areas. 1. Sustainable harvesting of kangaroosIn Australia, the existing kangaroo industry ismore than 30 years old and is demonstrablysustainable in so far as the number of individualsof each of the species harvested has on balancegrown in the interval since the industry beganwith all being among the most numerous of largemammal species in the world. Advocacy for thesense of this sustainable harvest has long beenpromoted (e.g., Wilson 1974, Grigg 1984, 1989,1995, 1997, 2002, Sattler 1995) although thereare some (e.g., Pickard 1990) who reasonablyargue for more data that would clarify or test thehypothesised conservation advantage beforeassuming this outcome. The health benefits of eating kangaroo are well-known (e.g., studies by the CSIRO Division ofHuman Nutrition) and include lean, verynutritional and tasty meat which if cookedcorrectly can match the tenderest beef despitehaving less than 2% fat—most of which ispolyunsaturated or monounsaturated and low incholesterol. The meat is also relatively free ofhuman disease with proportionately fewerkangaroo carcasses being rejected at the processingplants than cattle or sheep, despite more intenseinspections (J. Kelly, pers. comm. 2001). Thisreflects the fact that kangaroos are marsupials withcollectively 200 million years of evolutionarydistance between them and us and thereforesignificantly reduced likelihood of shared parasites(e.g., there is no such thing as ‘mad kangaroodisease’). As the rest of the world begins to worryabout farming cattle, sheep and pigs (all placentalmammals related to us), sustainably-harvestedfree-range kangaroo is increasing in internationalas well as national appeal.To whatever extent graziers could shift from totaldependence on raising cattle and sheep with theirattendant economic and health risks, and commitpart of their grazing lands to native bush withsustainably harvestable kangaroos (and otherresources such as appropriate plants), thereshould be benefits in all directions. Kangarooswould gain in population size, distribution and

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security through being valued by graziers insteadof being regarded as pests that compete with theirstock. No mammal that has become the focus ofagricultural interests has gone extinct. Non-targetspecies should benefit (although this needs to betested rather than presumed) because the grazierneeds healthy biodiverse bush to sustainablyproduce the harvestable native resources. Grigg(e.g., 1997) has described the benefits that wouldcome from reducing sheep numbers in favour ofkangaroos on the rangelands as ‘sheepreplacement therapy’. The grazier gains becauseof the potential for sustainable value-addingincomes and a broadening of the resource basemaking their overall incomes more resilient toenvironmental or market disasters. The consumergains because they have a wider range of healthyproducts available to them in the markets. Theeconomy gains because of an increase in uniqueAustralian products, market resilience and greaterstability in the rural/regional sectors. Despitesharing financial benefits with graziers, even thekangaroo industry should gain because of a rise inconsumer interest (driven by increasing publicawareness of the conservation value of sustainablyharvesting native wildlife) and in the volume ofmarketable product as more land is valued asanimal-rich bushland.An interesting experiment is taking place onMulyungarie Station, a 3300 km2 pastoralproperty in South Australia owned by theMutooroo Pastoral Company (Hoy 2001). Aerialsurveys conducted by university teamsdemonstrated that there are 165,000 RedKangaroos on the property—the equivalent interms of grazing pressure to 110,000 sheep. TheStation’s overseer, Richard Gloster, understandsthese Reds to be a sustainably harvestableresource and that they are ‘…as valuable in thepaddock as sheep’. Each year they have beenharvesting for profit an average of 8,000 to10,000, mainly males with an average weight of40 kg. Ongoing surveys by the University of NewEngland over the last eight years havedemonstrated that the number of kangaroos onthis station has increased from 20 to 50 per km2. Recent modeling of harvesting strategies in place(McLeod 2001) indicate that it would notendanger any of the species involved—in fact quitethe opposite. Because harvesting which focusesprimarily on males increases the proportion ofbreeding females in the population, and becauseonly one male mates while the other non-matingindividuals consume resources, the percentage of

reproductive individuals in the population actuallyincreases. Suggestions that somehow the geneticcomposition of the population will be significantlyaltered by harvesting has been disputed bygeneticists (Hale 2001) who argue that forpopulations of species such as Red Kangarooswhere the numbers are in the millions, harvestingon the scale conducted by the kangaroo industrycould not possibly affect the genetic balance of thespecies. Research by Wilson (1988), Pople & Grigg(1998), Pople et al. (2000), Grigg (2002) andauthors cited therein similarly support thebiological and economic viability of the industry. Suggestions that shooters preferentially targetinglarge males will alter the population structureand survival capacity of kangaroos (Croft 1999)fails to consider that for at least the last 60,000years Indigenous Australian hunters also wouldhave maximised their chances of a successfulhunt by targeting the large males with noapparent ill-effects—Red Kangaroos, forexample, have been around and sound for at leasttwo million years. The kangaroo industryprobably contributes to the restoration of thetraditional pre-European balance.Animal rights advocates claim cruelty is aninherent part of the industry and that this is areason to stop sustainable harvesting. Manyothers before me have pointed out the seriouslymisleading and frequently dishonest nature ofthese claims (see in particular Hopwood 2001).Hoy (2001) points out that a central part of amajor campaign by animal rights advocates was avideo purporting to show the kangaroo industryat work—with acts of cruelty involved. But theircampaign was dealt a serious blow when Germancourts convicted the film-maker Michael Born offraud. They found he had in fact fabricated thefootage. The ‘hunt’ had been staged in 1986 forthe camera and conducted by an unlicensedshooter who did not have permission to hunt onthe property, did not have a gun licence, hadnothing whatsoever to do with the kangarooindustry and has since been prosecuted. Evidencewas presented that he had been activelyencouraged by the animal liberationist film groupto commit the acts of cruelty which they thenfilmed, having also convinced him that they werefrom an American game shooting magazine. Thisbizarre fabrication was then used by animalliberationists to persuade British supermarketsthat they should not stock kangaroo meatbecause this was a demonstration of how theindustry operated.

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The reality is that the vast majority of kangaroosculled are head-shot (>98%; confirmed by recentsurveys conducted on behalf of EnvironmentAustralia and the Australian Royal Society for thePrevention of Cruelty to Animals), by TAFE-accredited harvesters, at night while the animalsgraze resulting in a quick, unanticipated andrelatively painless death. But beyond this, it isimportant to acknowledge that if a kangaroo is notharvested in a humane manner, it will die an

unquestionably painful, stressful and prolongednatural death either from starvation or predation—they are not, as many of us would otherwise like tothink, immortal. Sustainable harvesting of free-range herbivores has been acknowledged by PeterSinger, advocate for many animal liberationistorganisations, to be far less stressful to herbivoresthan mustering, yarding and finally road transportto abattoirs. This is a shared view that has beenexpressed by the RSPCA: ‘If achieved correctly,

Fig. 9. Animal rights groups such as Viva!, whose English founder and Director Juliet Gellatley is pictured on thefront page of the 19 July 2001 issue of the The Land (with a decidedly ambiguous headline), infuriate graziersand rural communities with emotive arguments that all kangaroo harvesting should stop immediately because itis cruel and inappropriate. (Reproduced with permission.)

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kangaroo culling is considered one of the mosthuman forms of animal slaughter. An animal killedinstantly within its own environment is under lessstress than domestic stock that have been herded,penned, transported etc.’ (RSPCA 1985). 2. Sustainably harvesting other species—animals and plantsCurrently very few native species are sustainablyharvested for meat and that may always be the case.The point is not to find human food value ineverything native–rather in a few relatively robustspecies, such as some kangaroos and emus, that cansustainably provide the economic incentive to repairor secure more natural bush which in turn willenhance the survival capacity of millions of otherspecies that most of us do not even know exist. Obviously conservation and economic benefits canalso flow from a focus on sustainably harvestingappropriate native plants for a range of potentialreasons including decorative flowers, garden plants,medicines and food. Examples of food include theseeds of various Wattles (Acacia spp), the deliciousblueberry-like fruits of Midyim (Austromyrtusdulcis), the prince of nuts obtained fromMacadamia trees (Macadamia spp.), Bunya Pineseeds, the wide range of fruits and other productsfrom native Figs (Ficus), exotic Davidson’s(Davidsona pruriens—which also makes a finewine), Illawarra (Podocarpus elatus) and KakaduPlums, Bush Tomatoes (Solanum centrale),Quandongs (Santalum acuminatum), the tasty fruitsof Lillipillies (Syzigium australe), Wild Limes (Citrusaustralis), Wild Rosella, etc.—the list is delightfullylong (regularly discussed in Australian BushfoodsMagazine). Other reviews of native plant bushfoodsin Australia include Bruneteau (1996), Cherikoff& Isaacs (1991), Graham & Hard (1997), Isaacs(1996), Latz (1995), Low (1991), Roberts et al.(1995) and Stewart & Percival (1997).Many brightly-coloured native flowers andfoliage are also sustainably harvestable resources(Brunckhorst et al. 1999), sometimes appreciatedby others first—e.g., New Zealanders who arecurrently marketing Australian Waratahs as ‘NewZealand Roses’, grabbing market advantage asthey cheekily did by marketing ChineseGooseberries as Kiwi Fruits. Native plants are also valued for buildingmaterials such as Broombush (Melaleucauncinata) for fencing and many native hardwoodtimbers used for building and fine furniture suchas Cypress Pine, Mulga, Gidgee, Ironwood,Beefwood, Red Gum, Leopardwood andRosewood. There are many organisations, such as

the Australian Forest Growers Association,focused on sustainable harvesting of native treesrather than introduced species such as Pinusradiata. The planting of progressively harvestablestands of native timbers on private land, as aninvestment, is another strategy that can haveenormous financial and environmental benefits.3. Sustainable harvests for medicinalpurposesOf potentially very high value are the many nativespecies with medicinal properties. Among animalsrecently examined, exciting new families offungicides from frogs and antibiotics from Koalapouches and ants (Beattie & Ehrlich 2001) andeven marine molluscs (Benkendorff 2002, thisvolume). Plants with medicinal value includeLemon Myrtle (Backhousia spp), Tea Trees, NativeMint (Prostanthera rotundifolia) and Peppermint, allof which are reputed to have anti-microbialactivity, Mountain Pepper (Tasmannia sp.) beingstudied for its antifungal properties, PricklyFanflower (Scaevola spinescens) being tested forantiviral, antitumour and other significantactivities, and the Moreton Bay Chestnut whichbesides producing exquisite furniture woodproduces castanospermine which is being invest-igated for its potential in the treatment of AIDS.Reviews of potential or realised medicinal value ofnative plants include Cribb & Cribb (1981), Lassak& McCarthy (1983), Low (1990) and Armstrong& Abbott (1995). Undoubtedly only the tiniestfraction of native plants and animal compoundshave been tested for potential products of value. 4. Intellectual property rights toethnoecological knowledgeThere is an enormous amount of Indigenous‘ethnoecological’ knowledge in this area (e.g.,Warren 1992, Nations 1992, Latz 1995, Roberts etal. 1995). For example, the healing properties ofPrickly Fanflower have long-been extolled byIndigenous Australians. Programs initiated now tocapitalise on the food or medicinal properties ofnative species previously known by IndigenousAustralians to have these values need to recogniseand acknowledge traditional intellectual propertyrights, a moral issue that has been well discussedelsewhere (e.g., McNeil & McNeil 1989).International efforts to record, store and declareIndigenous knowledge have involved establishmentof networks of resource centres (e.g., CIKARD,LEAD, CIRAN, INRIK). Australia needs to do thesame thing rather than continue to allow this topicto be developed in an ad hoc manner by individualswith varying degrees of commitment to recognisingIndigenous rights in this area.

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Hunting for other reasonsApart from sustainable harvesting for food, thereare other hunting strategies that could increasethe conservation capacity of private rural landsuch as hunting for sport and/or hunting as a toolfor pest control (e.g., King 1988, King 1995,Marks 1994, Choquenot et al. 1995, Allen et al.1995, Asafu-Adjaye 1995, Falkena 2000, Dammin press). 1. Hunting native species for sport & profitHunting kangaroos for sport, while oncecommon in Australia, is no longer sanctioned.Yet hunting native animals for sport is the basisfor major industries on other continents such asEurope, North America and Africa with theadded advantage of increasing the value andimpetus to conserve native habitat. Examplesinclude sport-hunting programs focused on deer,grouse and many African mammals. Throughthis process, private land owners commit tomaintaining viable native habitat because theyreceive a sustainable income from those who payto hunt. In Australia there are establishedenterprises of this kind focused on the hunting,with a licence issued by the relevant wildlifeauthorities, of ducks, fish, some kangaroos andother native species on private land. Commercialfishing industries in freshwater and marineenvironments are too well-known to need furthercomment.2. Hunting of introduced species for sport& profitPerhaps more relevant to contemporary Australiaare programs and industries focused on thehunting of introduced pest species such as pigs,various species of deer, foxes and water buffaloes.Already many land owners charge for the right tohunt pest species on their property. Industries,clubs and magazines are growing up around pig-hunting in many areas of Australia such asQueensland. When collecting fossils nearCharters Towers years ago I was told by thestation owner that hunters were happy to payhim many hundreds of dollars to shoot a singleSpotted Deer which were in plague numbers onhis property. While this has the conservationadvantage of reducing numbers of feral animalsin native habitats, it also has the risk ofencouraging maintenance of these speciesbecause they provide a revenue stream. For thisreason, it might be better to eradicate theintroduced species and follow this withsustainable hunting of the kangaroos whose

populations would probably increase in responseto the reduction in total grazing pressure. Unfortunately eradication of introduced pests asa way of advantaging the native biota is oftenobstructed by animal rights groups (e.g., Singer etal. 1991). King (1988) notes the regrettablesituation on Round Island near Mauritius whereanimal liberationists hampered eradicationprograms focused on feral animals, thisinterference resulting in the extinction of nativespecies. Animal rights groups in Australia havesimilarly challenged the propriety of eradicationcampaigns focused on removing introducedspecies from Australian parks and protectedareas. Animal rights campaigns to stop the furtrade in foxes, an introduced carnivore inAustralia that causes major environmentaldamage (e.g., foxes ate all captive-bred andseriously-endangered Numbats when they werereleased into the wild, leaving only the radiocollars), has led to more extensive use of 1080 tocontrol their numbers thereby putting morenative animals at risk. If animal rights advocateswere really serious about the welfare ofAustralia’s unique and endangered animals, theytoo would advocate extermination or rigorouscontrol of all introduced species, feral foxes, cats,dogs, horses, camels, rabbits etc., by whatevermeans are available.

Farming native species?While sustainable harvesting of free-rangekangaroos or other suitable wildlife most closelyemulates traditional, environmentally-friendlystrategies, would it be that outrageous to considerthe possibility of farming native species as analternative to farming introduced species? Clearlythis is much stickier question fraught with many‘what ifs’ including the temptation for some tobreed for traits in the animals—or plants—thatmight make them more profitable or efficient tomanage. However, hopless kangaroos, stumpy-legged emus or rainbow-coloured Waratahswould be of distinctly limited conservation valueand hence not goals I would advocate. The primary advantage of farming native species,ideally in their present form, would be reduction inthe number of environment-damaging introducedspecies such as hard-hoofed ungulates like sheep,cattle and goats that crop lower, pulverise andexcrete less viable native seed, produce mazes ofanastomosing trails and cut up the fragile soilsallowing more of this natural asset to turn to dustthan would be likely to occur with kangaroos (e.g.,

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discussed by Grigg 1989, 2002). In terms of plants,Eric Rolls pointed out to me that there are manynative grasses such as Curly Mitchell Grass(Astrebla lappacea) that was said to have ‘earsnearly six inches long, well-filled with a clean-looking firm grain’ and it may have been thisspecies that was used to supplement meagre rationsof wheaten flour during WWII. Native Millet(Panicum decompositum) is another native grass thatwas favoured for bread-making by Indigenouspeoples. These and many other native plants suchas Oat Grass (Themeda avanacea) may have thepotential to be broadacre-farmed for profit, henceconserving through valuing a native species ratherthan clearing the natives to farm introducedspecies. Further, it is entirely possible that beingnative these species would be more resistant todiseases, droughts and other environmentalchallenges that for millions of years were part of theevolutionary forge that produced them. On the other side of the ledger with farmingwould be reduction in gains that come with free-range harvesting, both in terms of native animalsand plants, and the incentives to preserve theirnatural habitats. Farming animals or plants of anykind normally involves confining them asmonocultures to paddocks or fields without theneed for healthy bush to support them.

Native companions Few conservation initiatives seem to stimulateas much debate and hot air as that of nativeanimals as pets or companions (e.g., Vasquez2001; Viggers & Lindenmayer 2002; Hopwood2001). My promotion of this initiative is basedon seven issues: 1. my own and others’ personal experiences over

the last 35 years companioning a wide range ofnative animals;

2. convictions by other zoologists about theimportance of being able to keep nativeanimals as a way of obtaining informationcritical for their conservation;

3. convictions by other zoologists (and botanists)about the importance of keeping native speciesas a compatible way of minimising the risks ofextinction;

4. concerns about the extent to which Australianchildren are increasingly unfamiliar with andhence not driven to conserve native animals;

5. concerns about the sometimes fatal diseaseswe know humans can catch from dogs and cats;

6. the reality that native Australian animals arebeing kept successfully as companions outsideas well as within Australia;

7. and profound concerns that more ‘pets asusual’ will only exacerbate the rate at whichnative species are disappearing.

Personal experienceI did not set out to be an advocate for nativeanimals as pets—it just happened. As a lover ofall animals and PhD student in the late 1960sfocused on the phylogenetic systematics ofcarnivorous marsupials, a friend offered me thechance to raise at home a laboratory-bred babyChuditch or Western Quoll (Dasyurus geoffroii).The experience quite simply changed my life. Atthe time I lived in a Perth flat, with twoDomestic Cats, the only animals I thought atthe time to be suitable as flat pets. I did notknow about the lethal risks of Toxoplasmosiswhich is commonly carried and communicatedto marsupials by Cats—but nothing happenedto this Quoll so perhaps these Cats were ‘clean’.Suffice it to say that over the next six years therelationships that developed between thatQuoll, me and all others who came in contactwith him was catalytic. He was obsessively clean, never failing to use abox of kitty litter for all excretions, dog-like inhis love of play throughout his life (viz OgdenNash: ‘The trouble with a kitten is that;Eventually it becomes a cat’), bright and quickto learn, far more affectionate and attentivethan a Cat, intently curious, happy to play onhis own but clearly happier to play with me,active particularly in the late afternoons andevenings and asleep at more or less the sametimes as me (one early morning activity periodoverlapped with my sleep but play-tussling witha hand kept him happy), puppy-like whenplaying even as an adult, careful to mouthwithout biting, content to fall asleep in my lap,generally very quiet with only ‘purring’, clicks or‘Nark!’ sounds rather than yowls or barks, no‘spraying’ or other stinky habits, and generallyfascinating. Although as a youngster he wasoften bullied by the Cats, as a Cat-sized adult hewas more than a match for them and they soonlearned to leave him alone. When I moved toBrisbane I let him out into the backyard, as onewould a dog or cat, and he freely came in andout of the house. Sadly, on the second evening,he mouthed an introduced Cane Toad (Bufomarinus) and died in my arms 20 minutes laterfrom bufotoxins, at the middling age of 5.

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That tragic loss of my special spotted friend wasjust the beginning for me of many years raisingand interacting with a wide range of nativemammals in domestic situations. While not allproved as suitable for flats or houses as thatQuoll, most proved to be very affectionate,interactive and highly tractable—often as ormore rewarding as companions than Dogs and farmore so than Cats, although I allow that for somepeople, an attentive pet is not what they want.These native animals, some close companions fornearly 12 years, included Squirrel Gliders(Petaurus norfolkensis), Yellow-bellied Gliders (P.australis), Fruit Bats (several kinds), Ring-tailedPossums (Pseudocheirus peregrinus) and manyothers. These are social species that rapidly bondacross species boundaries with instinctivebehaviours such as head-rubbing in Gliders thatin natural populations establishes and reinforcessocial cohesion within family units—theydeclared in head-rubbing the back of my neck

that they enthusiastically accepted me as amember of their immediate family even though Imust have seemed a rather ugly possum.Although I have also had Swamp Wallabies(Wallabia bicolor), Nailtail Wallabies (Onychogaleaunguifera), Rufous Bettongs (Bettongia rufescens)and Brushtail Possums (Trichosurus vulpecula) ashouse companions, each had a downside. Whilethe Swamp Wallabies were very affectionate andinteractive day and night, they were also rathermessy house guests. Rufous Bettongs and NailtailWallabies were too rough when playing andBrushtail Possums, while great as youngsters,could not resist nibbling toes when they becameadult. Each, however, would have been fine inlarge, suitable backyards, or as visitors in thehouse, able to live outside.Other smaller mammals, such as MountainPygmy-possums (Burramys parvus), Kowaris(Dasyuroides byrnei), Phascogales (Phascogaletapoatafa and P. calura) and many native rodentsincluding Hopping Mice (Notomys spp.) andRock-rats (Zyzomys argurus), were a delight andsuccess when maintained in ventilated terrariaor large wood/screen cages that I made for thepurpose. The incredibly beautiful native rodentswere regularly handled by my small childrenwith no risk of biting in contrast to the far moreodoriferous and sometimes nippy introducedHouse Mice (Mus musculus). Other smallmammals such as Antechinuses (Antechinusflavipes), Dunnarts (Sminthopsis spp) andPlanigales (Planigale ingrami) were too ‘highlystrung’, never seeming to settle down or

Fig. 10. Keeping native plants in our homes and backyards, rather than introduced plant species, helps to bondchildren to the importance of Australia’s unique creatures. Both the Western Quoll (Dasyurus geoffroii) andSwamp Wallaby (Wallabia bicolor) have been house guests of the author. (M. Archer)

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suppress the urge to bite when handled.Antechinuses allowed to run free in and out ofthe Brisbane house, however, were fantasticcockroach removalists! In all cases, tractability was enhanced throughregular interactions with the native mammals asyoungsters but also enhanced in adult mammalswith regular attention. Meeting these needs iscertainly no greater than meeting the same needsin Cats and Dogs. When I compare my own andthe attempts of others to settle down feral adultCats (forget it) and Dogs (rarely successful) withattempts to do the same with wild-caught adultmarsupials, the latter are far more likely torespond positively. To those who argue (e.g., Viggers & Lindenmayer2002) that Australia’s native mammals exhibit‘…limited interactive behaviour with humansand lack of domestication (including behaviouralproblems)…’ and that a native animal petindustry ‘…will not produce animals that areviable substitutes for existing domestic pets…’, Ican only say that these remarkable conclusionsmust reflect preconceptions or very limitedpersonal experience with Australian animals ascompanions. I would similarly repudiatearguments that my experiences may somehow beunique and therefore irrelevant to othersinterested in keeping native animals ascompanions because of the many similarexperiences others have reported to me anddiscussed in the literature.

Based on my own experiences and those ofothers, suitability of some native animals ascompanions is incontestable. In areas wheresome can be kept legally, such as Hopping-mice(Notomys) in South Australia, the programshave been demonstrably successful. In manycases, native animals are as or better-suited thanCats, Dogs and Mice despite the thousands ofyears of companionships we have had with thelatter three. The fact that Cats, Dogs, Mice,Rats, Rabbits, Ferrets, Lambs, Horses, Calves,Chickens and a host of other introduced speciesare defended as the only appropriatecompanions for humans reflects an arrogancethat ignores the geographic accidents of history.If colonial humans had evolved first in andspread from Australia rather thanAfrica/Eurasia, I have little doubt that viewsabout appropriate animal companions (andfoods!) would be very different than those wenow inflict on Australia.

2. Important information obtained by naturalistsabout native species studied at homeA lot of what we have learned in the past andneed to know in the future of relevance toconservation biology has come from ‘naturalhistorians’ who have kept these animals at home.This is particularly true for reptiles andamphibians. Allen Greer, a herpetologist in theAustralian Museum, suggests that a great deal ofwhat we know about Australian reptile behaviourand reproductive biology has been produced inthis way by amateurs. The same principle is alsotrue for other groups such as insects, fish,amphibians, birds and mammals. For example,before I kept a live Western Quoll, no scientistwas aware of the almost unbelievablereproductive anatomy and behaviour of themales. I published these (Archer 1974) and otherobservations about the ‘hard-wired’ biology andbehaviour of marsupials that had not emergedfrom centuries of study of pickled beasts orshadowy creatures seen at a distance in starlight.The same flow of information useful forconservation has probably resulted from thebreeding and study of native Australian plants inprivate collections but this is an area with whichI am less familiar.3. Safe harbours for species threatenedwith extinction in the wildHow many species or distinct taxa now extinctin Australia might still be with us if we had takenthem in as companions, even while we weredestroying or significantly altering their wildhabitats or unsustainably persecuting them inthe wild? I cannot help but wonder whether theThylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) would nowbe extinct if early settlers in Tasmania had madea serious effort to keep this magnificent animalas a domestic companion instead of just Dogs.From Col Bailey’s investigations and BobPaddle’s research, clearly at least some becametractable even after being injured as subadults intraps (Paddle 2000, Bailey 2001). Similarly,although there are arguments about the survivalelsewhere of the freshwater Lake EachamRainbow Fish (Melanotaenia eachamensis) oncecommon in Lake Eacham on the AthertonTableland of Queensland, it is now clear thatbecause of the interests of aquaculturistsdescendants of the nevertheless highlydistinctive Lake Eacham form thrive inhundreds of aquariums throughout Australia(including my own in the Australian Museum!)despite having completely disappeared from

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Lake Eacham itself. Reintroduction of nativefreshwater fish from captive stocks damaged byabuse of river systems has been an activeconservation strategy for other species(Cadwallader & Lawrence 1994) such as GoldenPerch (Macquaria ambigua) and Murray Cod(Maccullochella peeli). And again, because of theinterests of aviculturalists, many species ofdistinctive Australian birds have guaranteedfutures in breeding colonies not only here but inmany areas of the world, a security againstextinction in the wild. While some would arguethat if a species survives only in captivity, it iseffectively extinct, I think this is an absurd viewand one most unlikely to be shared by the speciesthemselves. As self-determined custodians ofEarth’s biodiversity, we have a moral as well as aselfish responsibility to minimise the loss of thatbiodiversity. The more thriving colonies thereare of any creature, animal or plant, captive orwild, the less likely that creature is to disappear.4. Out of sight, out of mind—theimportance of ‘bonding’ through close &constant contactI worry that our kids are loosing interest in theimportance of Australia’s native animals—andplants for that matter. Before and duringcolonial times, children were surrounded by

native creatures. Story-tellers wrote uniquelyAustralian yarns with them as the maincharacters and in many ways, our livesdepended on them—so we valued them. Thatwas then. Last year, I asked children between 5and 10 years old in a large Sydney shoppingcentre on a Saturday morning to name tenanimals. Of the 40 who responded, 85% failedto mention a single native animal. They werebristling with Cats, Dogs, Cows, Elephants,Zebras, Tigers, Lions, Rhinoceroses and otheranimals of the kind they either lived with, sawon television, read about in books, or stared atin the Zoo. They maintain keen awareness inparticular of the introduced Dogs and Cats theylive with and regularly encounter. But of theones that even mentioned a native animal, itwas a generic rather than specific response. Forexample, the only child who mentionedkangaroos listed the ‘Kangaroo’ when there arein fact over 53 different kinds in Australiaalone. There is here, I think, an importantmessage. Our children, the generation weexpect to maintain a focus on conservation, maybe losing awareness that distinctive Australiancreatures exist and, if that awareness declines,so inevitably will the sense of value or concernfor their future.

Fig. 11. One of the arguments in favour of keeping native animals as companions is the bonding nature of theexperience. It is probable that the capacity for humans to contact cetaceans in captivity has contributed to thegrowing global commitment to conserve them. (Courtesy Dolphin Research Centre and S. Hand)

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This view is shared by many others includingresponsible companies like Cadbury whichintroduces kids (and adults) to a vast range ofAustralian native animals, living and extinct, ascoveted collectables inside their Yowie series ofchocolates. While this primes their interest, if livenative animals are not allowed to come closeenough to capture the hearts of children,children will be less likely to allow them space intheir hearts. Close contact with marine mammalsin oceanariums has gone a long way tocommitting most humans to the love and henceconservation of whales. In a similar way, havingnative animals as companions would go a longway to committing Australian children to theirnovelty and need for conservation.5. Relatively low risk of diseases sharedbetween humans and Australian nativeanimalsThere has been speculation about dangerousdiseases we might get or communicate to nativeanimals if we had these rather than Cats and Dogsas companions. First, some evolutionary realitychecks. The mammalian companions we now keepclosest to us such as Cats, Dogs, Rats, Mice, Ferrets,Rabbits, Cows, Sheep and Pigs, are placentals, thesame group to which we belong. As noted above,marsupials and placentals split from a commonstock over 100 million years ago giving a combinedminimum of 200 million years of evolutionarydivergence between the two groups. It is inevitableif regrettable that we would share more diseaseswith our placental relatives than we would withmarsupials. And that is what the medical recordshows (e.g., Basile 2001, Reithinger 2001). Dogcommunicate to humans a wide range of seriousdiseases including Hydatid Tapeworms(Echinococcus granulosus) which can lead to nasty,sometimes fatal cysts in many parts of the bodyincluding the brain), Rabies (not yet in Australia[although similar to Bat Lissavirus], but for howlong?), Leptospirosis (serious parasitic infection,also carried by some rodents), Flesh-eating Bacteria(Leishmania infantum) which can lead to chronicloss of bodily tissues through zoonotic visceralleishmaniasis, visceral Larva Migrans, Giardia,Ringworms and many others. From Cats we areknown to get serious and sometimes fatal diseasessuch as Toxoplasmosis (Toxoplasma gondii), whichcan kill or deform children in the womb and lead todeath in adults, and Cat Scratch Fever whichalthough normally a simply treated illness has beencorrelated with encephalitis, hepatitis, pneumoniaand other serious illnesses and is potentially fatal in

people with compromised immune systems.Relatively recent discoveries include that keepingCats with kids can increase by 25 times the risk oftheir developing rheumatoid arthritis if there is afamily history of the problem (Hood 2001), andthat humans can contract Plague from Cats. ThePlague bacterium (Yersinia pestis) that had itsgenetic code sequenced was in fact taken from thebody of a vet in Colorado who died fromPneumonic Plague after a Cat sneezed on him as herescued it from under a house. Cats can alsocommunicate Plague to humans through scratches,bites and infected fleas. More recent andunexpected research has demonstrated that felineimmunodeficiency virus—FIV—can be communi-cated to primates (Macaques exposed caught thedisease) which then go on to develop the typicalsymptoms of AIDS already well-known and fatal tohumans. Although there has as yet been no knowntransmission of FIV to Humans, the possibility ismore likely now that it has been shown to betransmissible in particular to anthropoid primates,the group to which we belong. While these andother serious diseases that Cats and Dogs cancommunicate to humans are unlikely to stoppeople from having them as pets, they justifyconsideration of the potentially much greater safetyof keeping native marsupials as companions. Manythousands of marsupials have already been kept ascompanions and few if any serious illnesses tohumans have resulted—an expected result giventhe evolutionary distance of marsupials andplacentals. Viggers and Lindenmayer (2002), whilestressing the possibility that Australian nativeanimals might have as yet undetected illnesses thatwe might be able to catch, fail to mention the manyserious illnesses we are known to be able to catchfrom Cats and Dogs. While agreeing that lack ofcaution is never wise, we should not turn our backon trials of native animals as potentially much safercompanions. To do so would really be an abuse ofthe precautionary principle. If worries aboutimagined diseases in marsupials are valid reasons fornot taking the risk of trialing them as companions,where is the converse logic in continuing topromote Cats and Dogs as companions when theyare known to communicate serious and sometimesfatal diseases to humans? 6. Successful programs overseas involvingAustralian animals as companionsThere are already many programs in place forkeeping Australian native animals—and they aresuccessful. Besides the few programs alreadyunderway and successful in Australia, there is a

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blossoming American trade in some Australian/New Guinean marsupials such as that in SugarGliders (Petaurus breviceps) which are marketedthere as ‘Pocket Pets’ in reference to their small sizeand tractability. A spin on the internet revealsmany overseas Sugar Glider Societies, supportorganisations and care manuals that maximise thelikelihood of these captive-bred, beautiful andsocial marsupials making successful companions.The irony of having the United States declare anddemonstrate the success of keeping Australianmarsupials as companions will not be lost on thosetrying to promote—in our case as a conservationstrategy—the same initiative within Australia.

7. Conservation costs of sticking with‘business as usual’ as the only way forwardOne of the most important reasons for advocatingnative animals as companions is that ‘pets as usual’is not contributing in any way to conservation ofour native animals. Quite the contrary; if it remainsunchanged, it will lead to further loses of nativespecies and continuing degradation of the bush.This is not to say, of course, that land-clearing and

other factors damaging the bush are not majorissues limiting the prospects for long-termconservation. But those factors do not nullify ormake irrelevant conservation losses attributable toCats and Dogs. These are constantly escaping orbeing released into the bush with predictableconsequences—massive numbers of consumednative animals being turned into more feral Catsand Dogs and more risk of toxoplasmosis beingcommunicated by Cats to marsupials in the bush.Some wildlife experts consider that, after drought,toxoplasmosis communicated by feral Cats is thesecond biggest killer of native animals. In apublication entitled Cats and wildlife, Anon. (1994)notes that Cats have been found to eat more than186 species of native birds, 64 species of mammals,87 species of reptiles and 10 species of frogs, andthat the average feral cat probably kills at least1,000 native animals a year. Dickman (1993)provides a sobering review of the ecological impactof feral Cats and Hopwood (2001) notes thatdomestic Cats consume between 30-63,000,000native birds alone each year. Add to this the otherissues noted above, including the fading focus thenext generation appears to have on the welfare ofour native species, and it seems to me more thanenough reason to seriously examine the potentialconservation benefits of keeping native animals ascompanions. Why is it that we can earn accolades,trophies and money for breeding and sellingintroduced Cats but be fined for breeding nativeanimals? There seems an awesome lack of logic inthis situation that we may well come to regret.

Fig. 12. Some Australian native mammals have alreadybeen trialed overseas as well as in Australia and found tobe excellent companions. Sugar Gliders (Petaurusbreviceps) are among the most popular ‘pocket pets’ inthe United States with support organisations, caremanuals, breeding facilities and experienced vets in 20States. (Courtesy International Sugar Gliders Association)

Fig. 13. There are those who see serious problems inhaving native animals as companions rather than or inaddition to introduced cats and dogs; others seepotentially vital conservation benefits in having thischoice. (Courtesy M. David)

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8. How could we begin to turn thisaround?What form could the native animals ascompanions initiative take? Certainly we shouldnot begin any trials before we have consideredthe issues noted in Viggers & Lindenmayer(2002) and by others whose experience in thisfield merits attention. However, the possibility of apotential problem should not in itself be anobstacle to conducting a trial under controlledconditions. It is possible to abuse theprecautionary principle in this situation by usingit to prohibit the trialling of potentially importantconservation initiatives because all of theiroutcomes cannot be determined before the trial.That is the point of trialling these initiativesunder controlled circumstances rather thansimply giving them an immediate and free run. If suitable native animals, identified through thisprocess, are bred in disease-free colonies, theycould be sold for a substantial price with part of themoney going to traditional conservation projectsfocused on the welfare of the same and otherspecies in the bush. Suitable species are notnecessarily those known to be common or in nodanger. In fact, as Paul Hopwood (2001) has

frequently pointed out, it is the species that areendangered that are most in need of urgentattention of this kind precisely because for thesespecies ‘conservation as usual’ is failing. Exampleswould include the Western and Eastern Quolls(Dasyurus geoffroii and D. viverinnus) which havemassively declined in geographic area sinceEuropeans arrived, and Mitchell’s Hopping-mouse(Notomys mitchelli) which while still surviving insouthern South Australia and Western Australia,has become extinct in New South Wales. Although other species should be considered interms of their eligibility, many of us consider thatwe should trial one or two native animals first iffor no other reason than to test through thisprocess the principle that having native animalsas companions can produce conservationbenefits without increasing risk. In the process ofplanning these trials, all legitimate concernsraised in the paper by Viggers and Lindenmayer(2002) and others should and would beconsidered. But it is important to recognise thatidentifying issues of concern does not in itselfprovide a reason not to trial those initiativesthrough carefully-conceived and managedprograms. That is the strategy those of us lookingfor increased conservation benefits throughprograms of this kind have always advocated.Should programs of this kind be restricted toanimals? Should we challenge the propriety ofbeing able to buy threatened native plantsproduced in nurseries as ‘companions’ to plant inour back yards? This capacity is taken for grantedas one among many compatible conservationstrategies that minimise the likelihood of extinctionof endangered plants. My backyard in Maroubra isplanted with native species that were almostcompletely destroyed as developers graduallycleared the surrounding bush decades ago. TheRandwick City Council, with Danny Ondinea, rana program of gathering and germinating seeds fromthese native species and providing these to anyonewilling to grow them instead of Oleanders,Hydrangeas, Camellias and other introducedgarden plants. When the Wollemi Pine wasdiscovered in its last-known refuge in the BlueMountains, sense prevailed and the Royal BotanicGardens of Sydney initiated propagation programsto enable interested members of the public topurchase this species thereby engenderingcommitment to its conservation and creating manymore breeding populations of this otherwiseseverely endangered ‘Pineosaur’. The principlesand conservation goals in these initiatives forplants and animals are basically the same.

Fig. 14. The common and widely promotedalternative to keeping native animals as companionsleads to proliferation of introduced species known totransmit disease and cause significant environmentaldamage, such as Cats. (WEB image)

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Other controversial strategiesto help avert conservationcatastrophesThere are many other compatible strategies thatcould be critical for conservation, such asreintroductions and creation of genetic librariesthat anticipate crises. 1. Reintroductions informed by understanding of pre-modern distributions

Before push comes to shove and whole speciesare at risk, I would urge we consider all availabledata about former habitats, some of whichcomes from the fossil record. For example,before rising global temperatures profoundly

alter the remaining alpine habitats of theMountain Pygmy-possum (Burramys parvus), itwould be wise to consider controlled, trialreleases into the mammal-poor lowlandrainforests north of the Daintree. Why? Becausefor the last 24 million years of burramyid possumevolution, species of Burramys have always beencompatible members of lowland rainforestcommunities. Even as recently as 4 million yearsago, they were in lowland rainforests insouthwestern Victoria. What would we losethrough a controlled trial except possiblyreduction in risk of lineage extinction? This is afour-dimensional extension of the principle ofseeking Indigenous knowledge about the

Fig. 15. The Wollemi Pine (Wollemia nobilis), recently discovered and one of the rarest plants in the world, is beingcultivated in breeding facilities with the intention of eventually providing plants for sale as one measure toincrease the chances of survival of this highly endangered species. (Courtesy Royal Botanic Gardens of Sydney)

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potential ranges for modern species knownbefore European arrival. As many politiciansand biologists and even the odd astronomer ortwo have commented, the further backward youlook, the further forward you may be able to see.2. Creation of genetic libraries—potentialcapacity for the futureThe wisdom of this strategy has been accepted bymost biologists concerned by current rates ofextinction and the need to have the capacity atsome time in the future to reconstitute geneticvariants or even species when we and the worldare well again. While most biologists would alsoquestion the probability of being able to recreateextinct species, few disagree with the need tosecure resources that might allow this to happen. The Australian Museum’s Thylacine Project isdriven by the opportunity, afforded by aThylacine pup (Thylacinus cynocephalus) pickledin alcohol (a DNA preservative), to see if it is infact possible to undo extinction. Considering that

their ‘time’ was not up and that we, notenvironmental change or evolution, houndedthem into extinction, many think that if we havethe capacity, we have a moral responsibility to dowhatever we can to bring them back—to givethem and us a second chance. There are otherpickled pups in other institutions providing thepotential for recreating both sexes and geneticvariation. If one cloned Thylacine can beproduced, thousands can. What would we dowith them? If successful, we would seek tomaximise their chances for survival and a newfuture through compatible conservationprograms including captive breeding colonies,releases into sanctuaries, protected islands andassisted establishment into still-suitabletraditional habitat in Tasmania. Perhaps wewould also consider a compatible program inwhich surplus individuals were available forhuman companions, a strategy that if followed acentury ago might well have made this wholeProject unnecessary.

Fig. 16. If all else continues to fail, there is a remote possibility that extinct species could be resurrected from storedDNA.The Australian Museum’s Thylacine Project is based on recovered DNA from a pickled pup (left). If the Project,against all odds, succeeds in producing many individuals, there are still many areas in Tasmania with entirely suitablehabitat into which it would fit like a recently removed hand from a still-warm glove. (Courtesy Nature Focus)

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The probability of success for this Project basedon current technology is low; but the likelihoodof a positive outcome without trying is infinitelyless. And along the way we will be pushingforward the research frontiers of this extremestrategy for conservation. Given the enormousamount of effort required and uncertainty ofsuccess, it is clearly not an alternative totraditional conservation strategies—if anything,quite the reverse. But, because it is a potentialcompatible conservation strategy in ‘hopeless’situations, we are going to push those frontiers ashard as we can to see what is possible. If we fail,there is not the slightest doubt that other moretechnologically-capable successors will beginagain where we leave off. Already other labs, likeAdvanced Cell Technology in the United States,are doing things once thought impossible such asinserting the nuclear DNA of endangeredspecies (such as the Mouflon Sheep, Ovismusimon) into the host cells of a different speciesand producing viable, healthy offspring that areclones of the endangered species. If this muchhas been done in the decade since the likelihoodof cloning was regarded as an absurdimpossibility, how can we say what will beimpossible in the decade to come?

We are not the first to trialalternative conservationstrategiesWhile not all of these alternative strategies are inuse in other countries, some have been whole-heartedly embraced elsewhere (e.g., Kiss 1990,Nations 1992, Marks 1994, Hasler 1999, Falkena2000, Damm in press). Compatible conservationprograms for sustainable harvesting, hunting,farming, ecotourism and protected area strategiesare being run successfully side by side in manyAfrican, North America and European countries.Their ongoing experiences, relevant to Australia,are the subject of a review in preparation, butcomments (courtesy B. Bohdanowicz and G.Wilson) are appropriate here. 1. Demonstrable successesExamples were presented in a recent conferencein Pretoria which several of us from theAustralian Museum attended. One example fromNamibia involved privatisation of environmentalmanagement and anti-poaching functions thatresulted in a 44% increase in native species, anincrease of 88% in numbers of animals andbiomass, and development of an economicallysignificant blend of game-farming, game-hunting

Fig. 17. There is an awful irony in the possibility, given Human indifference to the need for effective long-termconservation strategies, that even if the Thylacine could be resurrected, there are still individuals who would beintent on pushing it over the brink a second time. (Courtesy Polly).

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and tourism. East African examples (e.g., fromZimbabwe and Botswana) involved transfer ofwildlife ownership to landowners which led tosubstantial improvement in the local economyand increased well-being of these communities.Local communities benefited by access to gamemeat for local consumption as well as incomegenerated by limited trophy-hunting. Demonstrably compatible models of wildlifemanagement are working in southern Africaincluding private game ranches, cooperativegame reserves (conservancies) and national parksand reserves. Considering private game ranches,there has been a rapid increase in the number ofgame farms and ranches with approximately 9000in South Africa in 2000, covering 13% of thecountry’s land area compared with 5% allocatedto national parks—the result of exponentialgrowth in game ranches which has occurred inthe last decade. With demonstration of theviability of these new initiatives, more and moretraditional cattle-ranching operations are movingover to game-ranching. Many of these game ranches operate on narrowmargins because their operations are small orthey have little focus on ecotourism. Largerprivate game ranches, however, are very

lucrative. Current high prices paid for disease-free game (e.g. Buffalo currently bringingA$45,000 each) have supported high capitalinvestment in specialised secure facilities.Although market prices will probably declinewith time, these breeding facilities are usuallycombined with other activities that make themmore sustainable in the long term such asecotourism and photographic safaris as well asmeat-production and trophy-hunting, activitieswell-established in African culture. Emphasis on cooperative land ownership (calledconservancies) is a common feature of many ofthe African initiatives. These help to leveragebenefits from large fence-free tracts of landdedicated to wildlife utilisation because they areable to accommodate the large home rangesrequired by free-ranging large species.Many African examples of this model ofcooperative properties pooling their resources ina “commons” model are known. As well as notingdirect benefits to farmers and land-owners,several speakers at the Pretoria Conferencedescribed successful examples of cooperativearrangements that also provided benefits fromwild game-harvesting to the surrounding and/orparticipating communities.

Fig. 18. Many antelope species such as eland are freeranging on large game ranches with some feedsupplementation provided during extended dryperiods. (B. Bohdanowicz)

Fig. 19. The number of privately owned game ranchesin Southern Africa is increasing rapidly. Species such aselephant and buffalo are very lucrative both for gameviewing and sale of live animals to other gamereserves locally and internationally. (B. Bohdanowicz)

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The CAMPFIRE Program in Zimbabwe (e.g.,Hasler 1999, Child 1994, Martin 1994, Holdgate1996), Community Management Programme ForIndigenous Resources, initiated in 1988, hasevolved from a fledgling concept of ‘community-based wildlife management’ to a mature ‘co-management’ that has achieved a balancebetween the previously competing interests ofdifferent groups—i.e., stake holders such as thestate, community, private sector, internationalwildlife lobby groups, etceteras. Through these co-management strategies, CAMPFIRE hassuccessfully returned responsibility formanagement of indigenous natural resources torural communities. Before it was established, mostof the large animals involved such as Elephantswere considered by villagers with at bestindifference but more commonly as pest speciesbecause they raided and trampled their gardens—in short, they were not valued on private land.Hence poaching had become so rife that wildlifemanagers were soon helpless to stop it and wildlifenumbers were declining. The solution was toenable visiting hunters to pay for the opportunityto cull individuals as part of a managed program ofsustainable, free-range harvesting. The moneyderived was shared with the local villagers and theNational Parks system to provide effectiveconservation management, something they couldnot previously afford to do, and the meat soderived was provided to the villagers as an addedbenefit. By 1992-93, the villagers had began tovalue the biota because it brought a sustainableincome, poaching was in significant decline, theconservation capacity of private land involved hadsignificantly increased and there was lessdependence on and use of introduced cattle.Martin (1994), who promotes the CAMPFIREand other programs in Zimbabwe, points outanother aspect of this conservation strategy that tosome is counter-intuitive. Under traditionalprotectionist philosophies, rare species are the lastto be considered appropriate for consumptive use.In reality, it may be that the rarer the speciesbecomes under failing protectionist strategies, themore urgent is the need to explore new initiativesthat focus on giving it value. He comments“we…have a policy whereby any species whosenumbers have not increased as a result of legalprotection are now being ‘deregulated’ and, undercautious monitoring, various uses are beingpermitted. This seems to be producing positiveresults (e.g., with cheetah and roan antelope) andit gives the lie to the Precautionary Principle in thegiven circumstances.”

Trophy-hunting of Elephants and other largeanimals in these programs is a key contributor totheir success so it would be fair to wonder aboutpublic attitudes to the consumptive use,sustainable or otherwise, of iconic wildlife.There appears, however, to be little if anyproblem with multiple use programs thatinclude sustainable harvesting in Zimbabwe.This is particularly true because these programsdemonstrably provide conservation benefits inensuring long-term survival of species that arethe focus of the Program and incidental benefitsfor thousands more because their naturalhabitat is increasingly valued. In the same way,the fact that the Giant Sable is the nationalsymbol of Angola does not inhibit its sustainableuse by that country as a valuable source of meatand income through hunting as well as tourismand other compatible activities. Multiple useprograms of a similar kind focus on AmericanElk and Deer. While all Americans love theDisney film ‘Bambi’, millions do not hesitate tohunt and eat venison. Clearly, it is possible tohave one’s national icons and eat them too. Infact, in some situations it may well be a practicalprerequisite for their long-term survival.

Fig. 20. There are few problems in other countrieswith sustainably harvesting species that are alsonational icons.While American children love Bambi, asadults they also value venison (WEB image).

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Child (1994) concludes from his experienceswith the CAMPFIRE Project and others like itthat the keys to their success have been to:“make wildlife so valuable that farmers conserveit; recognize that resources compete for spaceand that in certain situations wildlife is the mostproductive and sustainable form of land use;recognize that economic signals will decide thesurvival of wildlife outside protected areas, andtherefore make sure that these signals reflect thetrue value of wildlife; promote the value ofwildlife in a situation where landholders andcommunities are resource proprietors; recognizethat people who live with wildlife ultimatelydecide its fate; and recognize that they will onlymanage it sustainably when there is an economicmotivation to do so, and when they have securerights to manage and reap the full rewards oftheir management inputs, and to prevent othersfrom doing so”.2. Pitfalls to avoidThis is not to say that all sustainable-harvestingexperiments have had nothing but positiveoutcomes. Along with its many successes, thesouthern African wildlife ranching model hasrevealed a few potential risks. The first arisesfrom having too many small game ranches that,because of their small size, are unable to diversifyinvestment risk and are under-capitalised forlong-term survival in the face of economicchallenges from other industries. Falkena (2000)suggests that some game ranches have beenestablished because of a “…desire to improveknowledge of life by managing a relatively smallpiece of nature in an ecologically sustainableway”. Ideally, wildlife ranches should be largeenough or sufficiently amalgamated to achievelong-term economic resilience. The second risk is diminished gene pools in theabsence of a coordinated program to mix geneticmaterial between appropriate geographicalregions. Reserves that are too small could inhibitevolutionary resilience by restricting geneticvariation in natural populations. Although it isnot clear how important this is for all speciesbecause some, such as Cheetahs, are able topersist with considerably less variation thanothers, larger populations on average will bemore resilient to challenges than small ones.Most of these problems could be overcomethrough the strategy of developing ‘commons’which would create greater effective areas,population sizes and economic resilience.

Hopefully future research in Africa will test theequally important hypothesis that valuingstrategies of this kind will benefit the other 99%of the biota because of the community’s need topreserve natural habitat that produces thesustainably harvestable species. Most of theAfrican trials underway have been driven in thefirst instance by the need for more effectiveconservation of the more visible and hence morevaluable species such as mammals and birds. Consequent biodiversity benefits are complexand often controversial outcomes to demonstratelet alone quantify (e.g., Faith 2001). But withouta long-term assessment process in place, it will beimpossible to test the hypothesis that biodiversityoverall would benefit from sustainable use ofnative resources.

Another feature of the African models as a wholeis that many have developed in an ad hoc manner,integrating a dynamic blend of scientific as well asnon-scientific approaches, traditional andinnovative strategies. The outcomes, successful orotherwise, of many of these initiatives could bedescribed as the result of ‘learning on the job’.Serendipitously, those of us now conceivingAustralian programs to increase conservation/cultural benefits have the advantage of examiningthe outcomes of different kinds of trials alreadyunderway in Africa.

FATE: putting hypotheses aboutthe win/wins of valuing to the testAll would be rhetoric if rhetoric were where thisproselytizing stopped. For years I have beenlecturing to anyone who would listen that wemust get off our rear ends, now, and dosomething to turn things around. The losses, theproblems, the compromised futures for rural andregional Australia as well as our biota, are allpainfully clear. As those concerned about lack ofgovernment commitment to reducinggreenhouse gas production point out, when yourhouse is burning, you don’t turn your back on thecrisis to demand more research into the causes offire—you put the fire out to minimise the lossand then do the research to reduce further risk.As Paul Ehrlich has said, the first rule ofintelligent investigation is to keep all the parts.That is not to say that long-term research intothe causes for ecological/extinction crises is inany way not an absolutely essential focus; quitethe contrary—it is the critical core of the strategyoutlined below to test the hypothesised gains in

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biodiversity and economic viability for rural andregional Australia. That said, the undisputedneed for more research into conservation/extinction issues should not be used as an excusefor not tackling accepted threats to biodiversitysuch as land and water degradation. 1. Accepting the need for changeAt the most basic level, transcendent factors thathave been damaging our rural environments andlifestyles have been identified, such as land-clearing, uncontrolled irrigation and overuse ofinappropriate fertilisers. Thousands of researchpapers and books have already been publishedabout the topic. Eurasian-style agriculture usingmonocultures of introduced species to feed anincreasingly overpopulated continent has takenus down a steep and degrading path. We knowthis and we have done a lot of talking about whatwe should do to turn things around, but adequateincentive to change, apart from fear, always seemsto be not quite there. We are creatures of habitwho find it very difficult to change old habits,particularly when those were the result ofprograms once advocated in good faith bygovernment. Having been urged for so long not tointegrate ourselves sustainably into the naturalresource systems of Australia, we now findourselves in deep trouble on both sides of thefence. Yet it is my personal conviction that we canchange, and can achieve a sustainable life style, ifwe do it gradually, and if there is real economicincentive for taking each step along the way.2. The FATE Program—proposal forexperimental trials in the degradingrangelandsFATE stands for the Future of Australia’sThreatened Ecosystems. Although an initiative ofthe Australian Museum established in 1999, theFATE Program is now a whole of Governmentinitiative with many agencies and non-government organisations involved to one degreeor another as partners. The FATE Team withinthe Australian Museum has coordinated twoworkshops to define and refine the objectives andstrategies of the Project. In its simplest concept,the FATE Program is to be a test of the hypothesisthat long-term benefits for biodiversity and ruraland regional Australia can be achieved throughsustainable use of native resources. It will build onwhat has been discussed above, and the wisdom ofmany Australians who for years have articulatedthe same vision in one form or another. We havegot to change our mindset about appropriate ways

to use Australia, its lands, its waters and its life, orthe future will be bleak.As I write, we are nose-down and bum-uprefining the final form of the FATE ProgramProposal. Although it will be a dynamic andwide-ranging program of initiatives, bothconceptually and geographically, it will have as itsfirst focus the degrading rangelands of NewSouth Wales which are suffering some ofAustralia’s highest losses in biodiversity andlifestyle of its peoples. We have yet to pick themost appropriate precise location(s) but havebeen traveling throughout the State, talking withgraziers and local communities who have aninterest, often as keen as ours because ofincreasing desperation as well as shared vision, totake part in the FATE Program. Although details of the proposal will change as theProgam develops, we intend to select a bioregionor basin within which many graziers would be keento work with FATE advisory groups to developwildlife conservancies that operate as a ‘commons’(e.g., Brunckhorst 2000, Coop & Brunckhorst1999). These commons, as currently conceived,would involve cooperative adjacent properties anda sharing of profits from sustainable harvests on anequity basis reflecting the share of resources eachproperty brings to the consortium. Properties thatdid not wish to participate would act asexperimental controls. Within this bioregion,various initiatives would be explored depending onthe attributes of the particular situation but ineach case the goal would be to diversify theirresource base for greater economic as well asenvironmental resilience. Despite differences, the private game ranchingindustry in southern Africa offers useful insights.The African “wild game ranching model” is basedon large mammal species that are able to deliverhuge economic returns in terms of meatproduction, breeding stock value and ecotourism.Although Australia does not have as many largespecies with the same tourist appeal, the ability todevelop a successful multiple landuse model basedon the utilisation of large kangaroo species for meatproduction together with cultivation of suitablenative plants for commercial products such as food,timber and pharmaceuticals (i.e., consumptive use)and an ecotourism/farm-stay experience thatshowcases Australia’s unique (albeit smaller-sized)fauna and flora as well as Australia’s stunninglandscapes (i.e., non-consumptive use), presentsvery significant potential for regional conservationand economic benefits.

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While the long-term goal would be to maximiseboth conservation and economic benefits througha progressive shift to dependence on sustainableharvesting of native resources, this wouldinevitably be a gradual process dependent on thedemonstration that there were economic andconservation benefits in the new strategies. Thetrial might begin with a dedication of 10% of agrazier’s property, ideally adjacent to similar areasdedicated to the same purpose by other members ofthe consortium, to establish or protect aconservancy of natural bush from which nativeresources would be sustainably harvested for profit(Davis 1995 reviews similar functional models).On the rest of the property, it would be business asusual. Then, if the sustainable harvesting is yieldingthe anticipated value-adding benefits, this wouldbe encouragement to consider increasing thepercentage of the property dedicated to this‘natural’ purpose, further pulling back fromdependence on the monocultures of introducedspecies on the rest of the property. Together, the particular blend of initiativesshould value-add to rural/regional incomes,broaden the economic resilience of thoseproperties and increase economic dependence onhealthy natural environments. Ultimately, itshould reduce infrastructure needs for individualgraziers through sharing of harvesting costs, evenreducing the need for fences as more free-rangingor dispersed native resources are shared betweenproperties. The land would begin to heal as abrighter, more resilient future took shape.

We also expect that this Program would have anadaptive land-management strategy componentsuch that activities conducted on particularproperties or parts of properties might well changeas individual FATE trials progressed, although theneed for long-term scientific monitoring of effectsarising from particular strategies would also needto be met to maintain our ability to test the basicFATE hypothesis about anticipated biodiversity/conservation gains. We also visualise that isolated properties, inother regions, would become showplaces forparticular FATE strategies such as thesustainable harvesting of a species of nativeberry or timber, and a Friends of FATEcommunity-based organisation that couldprovide a framework for urban individuals aswell as core participants to actually becomeinvolved in progressing these conservationinitiatives in rural and regional areas. Marketing concerns are vital and variousstrategies are now under discussion includingways to market-advantage all products (includingsheep and cattle) produced on cooperatingproperties because they are participating in theFATE conservation initiative. At the same timewe are planning native food festivals in capitalcities to introduce Australians outside of ruraland regional Australia to the wonderful tastesand other values of native resources, a strategyaimed at encouraging new markets andincentives to invest in new conservation-advantaging products unique to Australia. We

Fig. 21. In the rangelands of western New South Wales, graziers who appreciate the value of kangaroos oftenhave large mobs on their properties as well as sheep and cattle. Sustainable harvesting of these populationsshould have conservation and economic benefits in all directions (M. Archer).

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are very clear in our own minds that marketingaspects of these initiatives are vital if the wholestrategy is to be successful. There are someamong us who even advocate that market issuesshould be the primary ones addressed to ensurethe success of the rest of the Program.The conservation benefits we expect cannot betaken for granted. Devising and carrying outscientific tests to see if these actually do occurwill be the primary responsibility of theAustralian Museum and Royal Botanic Gardensof Sydney. The scientific model that will be a corepart of the FATE Program is now being finalised.One aspect will be initial bench-marking ofbiodiversity levels followed by long-termmonitoring of changes in the amount and natureof biodiversity taking place on control propertiesas well as participating properties that arechanging aspects of their land-managementstrategies. A key element of this assessment isthat it must be regional in focus. We hope to findbiodiversity gains from sustainable harvestingland uses that are complementary to biodiversityprotection elsewhere in the region. In this way,sustainable harvesting land use can feed into‘regional allocations of dedicated conservation,mixed use, and development that togethermaximise net benefits for society’ (Faith 2001).3. In principle support and objection tosustainable harvesting of native resourcesThe concept of the FATE Program has supportfrom many directions. Besides the millennia oflife-dependent testing it has had from indigenouspeoples on most continents and the currentrange of initiatives working on other continents,it also has legislative backing at all levels.Internationally, IUCN Resolution 18.24 agreedto at the World Conservation Union Meeting inPerth in 1990 and Resolution 2.16 agreed to bythe WCUM in Jordon in 2000 both stress theglobal importance of sustainable harvestingnative resources as a conservation initiative. InAustralia, there is the Environment Protectionand Biodiversity Conservation Amendment(Wildlife Protection) Bill 2001 and the 1998Senate Inquiry into Commercial Utilisation ofAustralian Native Wildlife. In New South Walesthere is the Sustainable Agriculture legislationpolicy document. This policy was launched inDecember 1998 by the Minister, Richard Amery.A review group was formed in April 1999charged with responsibility to report to thePremier and Minister for Agriculture on itsimplementation.

Many professional non-government organis-ations have taken similar stands aboutsustainable harvesting when it can be shown tobe sustainable. The World Wide Fund for Naturelong ago committed its support for the biologicalrational of sustainably harvesting kangaroos.Similar support now comes from the EcologicalSociety of Australia (ESA) and the AustralianMammal Society (AMS). The AMS PositionStatement on The commercial harvesting ofmacropods, adopted at its AGM in July, 2001,recognises: “That a reduction in total grazingpressure could be achieved more easily if thevalue of kangaroo products rose to the pointwhere they could be seen by landholders as avaluable resource; and the potential role of anincreased-value kangaroo industry to helpachieve that reduction, through providinglandholders with a mechanism to maintaineconomic viability at reduced sheep numbers;and therefore SUPPORTS IN PRINCIPLE theidea of achieving a conservation benefit from agovernment regulated, high value, sustainablekangaroo industry.” The ESA “Supports theconcept of sustainable wildlife use. Harvest ofnative wildlife provides an alternative totraditional agricultural practices that wouldallow natural habitats to provide an income tolandowners, and hence a reason to conservenative wildlife and their habitats. Sanction of aharvest or other use should take into accountpotential benefits to the conservation of thespecies and their habitats”. The AustralianVeterinary Association’s policy states that “TheAVA supports harvesting and culling of nativefauna provided it is done in a humane way inaccordance with current scientific knowledgeand agreed management plans and so as not toaffect threatened or endangered species”. In itssubmission to the 1998 Senate Inquiry intoWildlife Utilisation it stated: “The AustralianVeterinary Association believes that theAustralian kangaroo population is a unique andvaluable resource and that harvesting is alegitimate and humane use of that resource”(AVA 1998). Similarly, the Australasian WildlifeManagement Society’s Position Statement onthe Sustainable Commercial Use of Wildlife(1999) “SUPPORTS the concept of achievinghabitat and species conservation goals throughthe sustainable use of wildlife, whetherconsumptive or non-consumptive, as spelled outin the resolution adopted at the December 1999General Assembly of the International Union forthe Conservation of Nature (IUCN)…”. Similar

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support comes from CSIRO and the AustralianAssociation of Veterinary ConservationBiologists. These views and those of many otherinternational and national bodies clearly lendsupport to the importance of trialing initiativesthat could test the potential conservationbenefits of sustainably harvesting native wildlife. Some organisations, on the other hand, areopposed to sustainable harvesting initiatives, suchas ‘Australians Against the Commercialisation ofWildlife’, ‘Animals Australia’ and ‘Viva!’, the latterbeing an organisation that opposes the eating of allmeat (‘Vegetarians International Voice forAnimals’) although its recent campaign inAustralia, focused as it was solely on the harvestingof kangaroos rather than the eating of all meat,failed to draw attention to its overall objectives. Inreality, Viva! would rather Australians chucked alettuce on the barbeque. Other organisations havemixed views in their membership and therefore notsurprisingly may have mixed views in their policies.For example, the Australian ConservationFoundation’s original position (expressed in ACFViewpoint No. 1) was: “The Foundation can see nomoral argument against the economic utilisation ofnative animals, provided it is carried out understrict control and is based on biologically soundmanagement procedures.” Lunney (1995) suggeststhat their current anti-kangaroo-harvestingposition “…appears to owe more to one faction ofthe animal welfare lobby than the concept ofconservation...”. Because there is significantdivision today within the ACF’s ranks about thisconservation initiative, it is possible that its views inthis area might be reconsidered again at a laterdate, particularly if demonstrations of theconservation value of sustainable harvestingprograms continue to unfold. On three recentoccasions, appeals by animal rights organisationsfor demonstrations to protest some of the conceptsdiscussed above resulted in very small turn-outs(rarely more than a familiar group of 20). While Irespect and welcome contradictory views, theirswould appear to represent a small minority of thepopulation with far more people keen to trial newinitiatives that would increase conservation of thebiota and rural and regional Australia.

Comparing the merits of the keyindustries that utilise our landAs a beginning student who knew very littleabout the relative merits of processes thatthreatened environments, I just accepted thegiven wisdom that somehow highest on the list of

evils was mining. In the 1960s, few of mycolleagues in universities and museumsmentioned or even noticed problems caused byagriculture, but if a new mine were proposed,vitriol and indignation were quick to follow.Queenstown, Tasmania, was often cited as anunimaginably horrific demonstration of theenvironmental disasters of mining.Somewhere along the line, I opened my eyes. Thefirst time the blinkers came off I was flying overeastern New South Wales staring out at the vastpatchwork quilts of dry fields, erosion gullies andnearly treeless planes that stretched from horizonto horizon—the big wide brown. The few,isolated native trees left, living dead reminders ofwhat was formerly there before the forests wereclear-felled, ring-barked, burned or had theirseedlings incessantly eaten by sheep or cows ordestroyed by newly-risen salt, came suddenly intofocus. The problem is not mining which takes upa minuscule 0.02% of the Australian surface(1,520 km2); it is traditional agriculture whichhas been degrading 70% of the continent(5,320,000 km2) (Archer 1995).

Once the blinkers came off, nothing seemed thesame to me again. The Government’s Ecologicallysustainable development working groups; final report onAgriculture (Anon. 1991) as well as Mining andTourism, provided a warts and all costs and benefitsanalysis of these and other major industries.Agriculture came out poorly with high costs andrelatively low net yields, while mining wasproducing relatively large benefits for negligiblecost. Currently, mining produces $35 billion inexports which represents 34% of Australia’smerchandise and over 6% of Australia’s GrossDomestic Product (GDP). On balance, mining isthree times as financially rewarding and 3,500times less ecologically destructive than agriculture.An increasingly long string of overviews, includingBeale & Fray (1990), Flannery (1994), Francis(1998), Lowe (1999), White (1997), Pratley &Robertson (1998), Horton (2000), Rolls (2000)and many others, end with the same bony fingerleft pointing at traditional agriculture as the landuse strategy most in need of help. The FATE Program has been conceived in thehope that it will help to change our views aboutthe best way to sustainably utilise the land. But anational refocus is also needed to reassess therelative merits of the three biggest industries thatutilise the land: agriculture, mining and tourism.A rebalance of benefits and land damage should

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see far more encouragement given to the miningsector and tourism and far less to traditionalforms of agriculture. The latter, not the former,mines Australia unsustainably.And yet, if agriculture can be economicallyencouraged to embrace sustainable harvesting ofnative wildlife, it will of necessity conserve ratherthan consume the environment and in theprocess increase its own long-term future. Whereonce it was the proud and unassailable king ofAustralian industries, so it could be again.

Battling over the high ground ofthe heartAt the Royal Zoological Society of NSW’s forumA Zoological Revolution, several of us advocatingthe potential conservation value of sustainablyusing native resources found ourselves accused of‘not loving’ animals for their intrinsic value ratherthan for their potential economic value. GordonGrigg spoke for us all when he expressed hisoutrage at this remark. All zoologists I know whocommitted their lives to this field of research didso precisely because they do love animals,sometimes more than they can express. In myown case, I was carved from a warm, fascinatingand very private childhood spent in the wetlandsbehind our house, summer and winter, interactingwith turtles, frogs and snakes, and hugging trees ashard as my little arms could squeeze.I suspect childhoods of this kind were common tomany kids who later grew up to becomebiologists. To suggest that we who started out thisway somehow love animals less because ourresearch now involves scientific rigour andrational thought betrays a fundamental failure ofunderstanding. What I am suggesting in thispaper is advocated not for some avaricious,heartless or academically sterile reason butprecisely because I do love animals—and becauseI flatly refuse to allow ‘conservation as usual’ toenable these creatures to disappear without firsthaving tried everything that could work to turnthis awful tide of loss around. Damm (2000), considering appropriate strategiesto save Africa’s wildlife, commented that “Thosewho would bring an end to the sustainable use ofnature claim to possess a special sensitivitytowards animals. But they eat meat fromslaughterhouses, where others are paid to do thekilling on their behalf, they wear leather shoesand enjoy vegetables, fruit and grain grown onlands taken away from wildlife”. My frustration,

and that of others who share my vision, is withsome conservationists and animal rightsadvocates who close their minds to potentiallyeffective ways to deal with the ugly reality wehave created—the world’s sixth great extinctionevent, one that now threatens our own survivalshould we fail to understand what must be done.To advocate that we will stop the extinctions byisolating wildernesses and not interfering withthe biota is almost certainly to doom that biota—if that is all we do. Wilderness is a nonsense, aphantasm that arose after we walked out of Eden.With the possible exception (an ephemeral oneat best) of the polar ice caps and a few islands,humans and the world’s biota have beenintegrated for hundreds of thousands of years. Ifthe natural world is to have a future, we need tounderstand that love of animals has always led toa commitment to conserve when it was built onuse and dependence—not independence. Indigenous peoples who remain hunter/gatherershave a love and respect for animals, plants andecosystems that most of us simply could notunderstand, because in contrast to us they are stillan integral part of the environments upon whichthey depend. Their attitudes are shaped bythousands of years of understanding about theneed to integrate with and care for that which theydepend on. Once we stepped over the fence webuilt and walked out of that world, we lost the plotand stole their future. The mindset of animal rightsadvocates who argue against the value of usinganimals would seem as absurd andincomprehensible to hunter/gatherers as it wouldbe to the animals themselves. To argue, forexample, as animal rights advocates have with me,that a Koala would rather be dead than sold tobecome an exhibit in a Japanese zoo, strikes me asextraordinarily presumptuous, particularly onbehalf of the Koala who I suspect would be aswilling to pluck gum leaves in Tokyo as Taronga ifgiven that same choice. The initiatives I advocate that we should trial arebuilt on respect for strategies that have workedfor thousands of years, driven by love of thecreatures I want to see conserved for the futureand rationalised by expectation that increasingtheir value to rural and regional Australia willhelp to ensure their future and that of the biotasof which they are a part. What we need now arenot arguments about conservation driven solelyby the heart or solely by the head; we need anagenda built on the combined wisdom of both orboth are going to fail.

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ConclusionAmong the first jokes I heard in the bush in the1960s was the one about the parrot and the stone:when cooking a parrot, toss in a stone; when thestone is soft, throw away the parrot and eat thestone. I did not hear this joke until after I’d had ameal of cooked parrot provided by a bushy livingon the edge of what is now the salt-scaldedwheatfields of Western Australia. He had a permitto cull a limited number because they were raidinghis orchard. It was so tasty that when I later heardthe joke, I didn’t understand it even thougheveryone else thought it was funny. My guess isthat it would have been as meaningless to the earlycolonists and Indigenous Australians as it was tome. Native resources highly valued by IndigenousAustralians for thousands of years and earlycolonists for decades, gradually fell out of favour asintroduced European species, proper food forgentlemen, became more abundant at the expenseof the devalued native species. So today the joke isfunny to almost everyone because almost no onehas eaten a parrot.As clearly articulated in the Global BiodiversityStrategy paper in 1992, “Today’s biodiversityconservation entails a paradigm shift from ahistorically defensive position - the protection ofnature from the impacts of development - to anoffensive effort seeking to meet people’s needsfrom natural resources while ensuring the longterm sustainability of Earth’s biotic wealth.” There is little doubt in most people’s minds thatunsustainable land, environmental and culturaldegradation provide an urgent imperative tochange the way we now utilise Australian land. Itis my view, shared by many others, rationalised byinternational and national legislation, encouragedby the success of similar programs on othercontinents, and enshrined in the developing plansfor the FATE Program, that we have a moralobligation to rediscover how to tear down thefences and put people and environments backtogether for the benefit of both.

It has often been said that museums need to besafe places for ‘dangerous ideas’, a stimulus forrational, open debate about important issues.Some would argue that the ideas presented aboveare of this kind. Yet I would argue that the onlydangerous idea here is that we would not trialinitiatives that could return a future to ourenvironments as well as rural and regionalAustralia. But do we have sufficient courage toconfront conservative views to trial theseinitiatives, or will we stick with ‘business as usual’until there is nothing left to argue about? It is ourcall and the clock is ticking.

AcknowledgmentsAny of the ideas rolled out above that mightcause offense should be blamed on me althoughyears of interaction with many much brightercolleagues than me have inevitably rubbed off,changing or refining my own views. In particular,I sincerely want to thank: Paul Adam, PeterAmpt, Gwen Baker, Bob Beale, Don Blackmore,Barbara Bohdanowicz, Max Bourke, Hugh Brody,

David Brunkhorst, Bob Carr, Gerry Cassis, DesCooper, Phil Creaser, Dave Croft, Terry Dawson,Bob Debus, Jared Diamond, Chris Dickman, PaulEhrlich, Dan Faith, Rick Farley Judith Field,Patrick Filmer-Sankey, Guy Fitzhardinge, TimFlannery, Steve Ford, Richard Fullagar, BrianGilligan, Joshua Gilroy, Henk Godthelp, PhilGordon, Gordon Grigg, Peter Hale, Suzanne

Fig. 22. Sustainable use of native species has a verylong, and in terms of conservation, very successfultrack record for securing species that we nowthreaten. (From the Thomas Dick collection).

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Hand, Geoff Hemmings, Karen Higginbottom,Paul Hopwood, Alan Jones, Rhys Jones, RosKelly, David Kemp, Jennice Kersch, Tim Low,Ernie Lundelius Jr, Dan Lunney, Richard Major,Julian Malnic, Greg Martin, Erik Mather, ShaunMays, Brian McGowran, Steve McLeod, DuncanMerrilees, Roger Muller, Ian Perkins, Tony Pople,

David Ride, Martyn Robinson, Eric Rolls, JimShields, Bob Smith, students of Mammalogy andArid Zone Biology at UNSW, Paul Tacon, AlanThorne, Grahame Webb, Arthur & KarenWhite, Mary White, Peter White, GeorgeWilson, Steve Wroe and the Vertebratepalaeontology graduate students at UNSW.

References Allen, L., Hynes, R., Thompson, J., 1995. Iscommercial harvesting compatible with effectivecontrol of pest animals and is this use sustainable?Pp. 259-266 in ‘Conservation through sustainableuse of wildlife’ ed. G.C. Grigg, P.T. Hale, D. Lunney.The Centre for Conservation Biology, the Universityof Queensland, Brisbane.

Anon., 1994. Cats and wildlife. Pamphlet of theQueensland Department of Environment and Heritage.

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