The accidental environmentalist, one strange little bird, and you.
Written for ODONATA
How to save the most endangered bird in Australia.
The Plains-wanderer is a well named little creature. In evolutionary terms, it wandered off on its own a long time ago. In fact, it’s the only member of the Pedionomus family left on the planet, which makes it the most unique, and genetically isolated bird in existence. It’s also the most endangered bird in Australia, and the fourth most endangered in the whole world. There are less than 1,000 mature wanderer’s left in the wild, less than 300 in Victoria, and we now have a chance to prevent this unique little character from wandering off the face of the earth completely.
But we need your help.
Our aim is to buy, manage and permanently protect a vast area of habitat for the Plains-wanderer, and then eventually, return the land to its traditional owners, who’ll look after it as they’ve done for almost 50,000 years.
And the beauty of it, is that we’ll benefit too. We don’t have to isolate the land, leaving it for nature to reclaim, in fact that would be detrimental to the cause. The Plains-wanderer needs grasslands of just the right height and density – and the way we can keep it that way, is with cattle. So not only do we preserve the habitat of one of the most endangered, and genetically unique birds on the planet – but we also get to farm the land at the same time.
Nature, conservation and farming working in perfect harmony, as it should be.
The Plains-wanderer | One Strange Little Bird.
First of all let’s just say, there’s nothing plain about this little fellow. Although they can fly, if you come across a Plains-wanderer they’re likely to run off, and as they’re only about 15cm high they’ll quickly disappear into the undergrowth. They live in breeding pairs, and after the mother has laid her eggs it’s the father who looks after them until they hatch. Even afterwards he’s the primary carer for the first six weeks. And during this time of incubation, while the father is carefully tending his young - mum goes off and finds another mate!
This is a bird that does not conform, one little bit.
And they’re incredibly particular too.
The perfect habitat for a Plains-wanderer is a sparse, treeless grassland with 50% bare ground, 40% herbs and grasses, and 10% fallen leaf litter. Tussocks spaced around 10-20 cm apart. Vegetation less than 5 cm in height, with occasional widely spaced plants up to 30 cm tall.
Talk about demanding!
And yet, this is why the Plains-wanderer is so endangered.
Because most of the native grasslands they’re used to living in, have been planted with crops instead.
Vanishing Grasslands | Victoria and Worldwide.
Accounting for somewhere between 20 and 40 percent of the world's land area, grasslands exist where there’s not enough rain for a forest, but too much for a desert. They sit happily between the two zones, all over the world, and they’re also the best habitat on the planet for agriculture. So it’s an environment that’s vanishing quickly, which is a problem for the wildlife calling it home.
In Victoria, the grassland ecosystems are amongst the most depleted in the State, with only 25,000 acres left on private land, and disappearing at 5% every year - it won’t be long before it’s all gone. The best solution, of course, is to find a way for agriculture and wildlife to exist at the same time, and as far as the Plains-wanderer goes, one Australian family seems to have gotten it right.
Did you know, grasslands can help mitigate climate change?
A study of California's grasslands suggests they could even store more carbon than forests, as they’re less susceptible to wildfires and drought.
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