Nest 2 - Day 5

Thanks everyone for your help.

Oystercatchers have been part of the landscape here for as long most locals can remember. It was only when they started doing something different, like pecking around in the middle of the beach rather than on the edge where they usually feed, that we realised something special was about to happen.

So then you see they’ve laid an egg. OMG rush into gear, WTF! do some research. OMG they are endangered! OMG we can’t just lift the eggs and put them in an incubator! Only solution left, we need to work harder to find a way to help them.

All native species, including beach nesting birds, have problems coming out the ying yang. Most of these are because of mistakes made by people decades ago.

There are lot of new predators they have to deal with, most of them having a first name of feral. For Maianbar these include feral deer and feral fox. But we’ve also had an impact on native species. Feeding the aggressive gulls, leaving rubbish around on the beach for the ravens. People think leaving food scraps or unused bait around is ok as it will be broken down or feed the animals, but it only ends up attracting too many predators and causes an imbalance in species.

Communities are now seeing that mistakes made long ago now need to be fixed. It takes a bit of convincing for some members as they don’t like their world changing, even if they aren't actively using it. The fences we need to protect our oystercatchers are only different to the fences they use to protect their properties in that our oystercatcher fences are only up for 3 months of the year.