|
Sea Spurge Remote Area Teams
Sea Spurge Remote Area Teams (SPRATS) is an environment care group founded in 2007, using a volunteer adventure conservation model. The initial primary purpose of the group, made up of a number of teams, is to remove the invasive sea spurge flowering plant. The group was founded by Dr Jon Marsden-Smedley, a research fellow at the University of Tasmania's School of Geography and Environmental Studies. As of 2017, SPRATS have removed over 14 million plants. It is regarded as the "way of the future for community conservation" by the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service. Motivation Sea spurge has a toxic sap, and critically the plant changes the shape and ecology of the coastal dunes, pushing out shore nesting birds, and also negatively impacting Aboriginal heritage sites. The Tasmanian target area is a key area for the hooded plover, pied oystercatcher, and sooty oystercatcher. It is also a key feeding zone for the migrating orange-bellied parrot. The little tern is also adver ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sea Spurge
''Euphorbia paralias'', the sea spurge, is a species of flowering plant in the family Euphorbiaceae, native to Europe, northern Africa and western Asia. The species is widely naturalised in Australia. It invades coastal areas, displacing local species and colonising open sand areas favoured by certain nesting birds. Major eradication programmes have been undertaken in some areas, for example by Sea Spurge Remote Area Teams in Tasmania, with great success. Description It is an erect, glaucous, perennial plant A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ... growing up to 70 cm tall. The plant has many stems, dividing into 3-5 fertile branches, each branching further. The cauline leaves (arising from the stem, without stalk) are crowded, overlapping, elliptic-ovate (ovate ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Froggatt Awards
The Froggatt Award is presented to people who have made a major contribution to protecting Australia's native plants and animals, ecosystems, and people from dangerous new invasive species. The Froggatt Awards are named in honour of Australian entomologist Walter Froggatt, who, when the cane toad was released into Australia in the 1930s to control beetle infestations in the sugar cane industry, was a lone voice, lobbying the federal government to exercise caution. History The Froggatt Awards were first presented in 2003, by the Invasive Species Council. From 2003 to 2006 there was only one award per year. No awards were issued from 2007 to 2014. From 2015 there have been multiple awards presented, one each for various categories of activity determined each year. The original trophy was a stuffed cane toad, but is now a framed certificate. Name In 2006 the award was temporarily renamed from the Froggatt Award to the Biosecure Australia Award,Not to be confused witAustralian B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Environmental Volunteering
Environmental volunteers conduct a range of activities including environmental monitoring (e.g. wildlife); ecological restoration such as revegetation and weed removal, and educating others about the natural environment. They also participate in community based projects, improving footpaths, open spaces, and local amenities for the benefit of the local community and visitors. The uptake of environmental volunteering stems in part from the benefits for the volunteers themselves, such as improving social networks and developing a sense of place. Type of Environmental Volunteering Environmental volunteering can take many forms: 1) Practical: Perhaps most well known are practical forms of environmental volunteering. Volunteers may be involved in practical habitat management, vegetation cutting, removal of invasive species etc. 2) Fundraising: Many environmental organisations are charitable in nature and thus rely on donations for financial support. Volunteers may be involved in the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volunteer Organizations
Volunteering is a voluntary act of an individual or group freely giving time and labor for community service. Many volunteers are specifically trained in the areas they work, such as medicine, education, or emergency rescue. Others serve on an as-needed basis, such as in response to a natural disaster. Etymology and history The verb was first recorded in 1755. It was derived from the noun ''volunteer'', in 1600, "one who offers himself for military service," from the Middle French ''voluntaire''. In the non-military sense, the word was first recorded during the 1630s. The word ''volunteering'' has more recent usage—still predominantly military—coinciding with the phrase ''community service''. In a military context, a volunteer army is a military body whose soldiers chose to enter service, as opposed to having been conscripted. Such volunteers do not work "for free" and are given regular pay. 19th century During this time, America experienced the Great Awakening. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Australian Government
The Australian Government, also known as the Commonwealth Government, is the national government of Australia, a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Like other Westminster-style systems of government, the Australian Government is made up of three branches: the executive (the prime minister, the ministers, and government departments), the legislative (the Parliament of Australia), and the judicial. The legislative branch, the federal Parliament, is made up of two chambers: the House of Representatives (lower house) and Senate (upper house). The House of Representatives has 151 members, each representing an individual electoral district of about 165,000 people. The Senate has 76 members: twelve from each of the six states and two each from Australia's internal territories, the Australian Capital Territory and Northern Territory. The Australian monarch, currently King Charles III, is represented by the governor-general. The Australian Government in its exec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Citizen Science
Citizen science (CS) (similar to community science, crowd science, crowd-sourced science, civic science, participatory monitoring, or volunteer monitoring) is scientific research conducted with participation from the public (who are sometimes referred to as amateur/nonprofessional scientists). There are variations in the exact definition of citizen science, with different individuals and organizations having their own specific interpretations of what citizen science encompasses. Citizen science is used in a wide range of areas of study, with most citizen science research publications being in the fields of biology and conservation. There are different applications and functions of citizen science in research projects. Citizen science can be used as a methodology where public volunteers help in collecting and classifying data, improving the scientific community's capacity. Citizen science can also involve more direct involvement from the public, with communities initiating proj ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blackberry
The blackberry is an edible fruit produced by many species in the genus ''Rubus'' in the family Rosaceae, hybrids among these species within the subgenus ''Rubus'', and hybrids between the subgenera ''Rubus'' and ''Idaeobatus''. The taxonomy of blackberries has historically been confused because of hybridization and apomixis, so that species have often been grouped together and called species aggregates. For example, the entire subgenus ''Rubus'' has been called the ''Rubus fruticosus'' aggregate, although the species ''R. fruticosus'' is considered a synonym of '' R. plicatus''. ''Rubus armeniacus'' ("Himalayan" blackberry) is considered a noxious weed and invasive species in many regions of the Pacific Northwest of Canada and the United States, where it grows out of control in urban and suburban parks and woodlands. Description What distinguishes the blackberry from its raspberry relatives is whether or not the torus ( receptacle or stem) "picks with" (i.e., stays with) th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adventure Volunteering
An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme sports. Adventures are often undertaken to create psychological arousal or in order to achieve a greater goal, such as the pursuit of knowledge that can only be obtained by such activities. Motivation Adventurous experiences create psychological arousal, which can be interpreted as negative (e.g. fear) or positive (e.g. flow). For some people, adventure becomes a major pursuit in and of itself. According to adventurer André Malraux, in his ''Man's Fate'' (1933), "If a man is not ready to risk his life, where is his dignity?". Similarly, Helen Keller stated that "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." Outdoor adventurous activities are typically undertaken for the purposes of recreation or excitement: examples are adventure r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Middens
A midden (also kitchen midden or shell heap) is an old dump for domestic waste which may consist of animal bone, human excrement, botanical material, mollusc shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human occupation. These features provide a useful resource for archaeologists who wish to study the diets and habits of past societies. Middens with damp, anaerobic conditions can even preserve organic remains in deposits as the debris of daily life are tossed on the pile. Each individual toss will contribute a different mix of materials depending upon the activity associated with that particular toss. During the course of deposition sedimentary material is deposited as well. Different mechanisms, from wind and water to animal digs, create a matrix which can also be analysed to provide seasonal and climatic information. In some middens individual dumps of material can be discerned and analysed. Shells A shel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Petroglyphs
A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions of the technique to refer to such images. Petroglyphs are found worldwide, and are often associated with prehistoric peoples. The word comes from the Greek prefix , from meaning "stone", and meaning "carve", and was originally coined in French as . Another form of petroglyph, normally found in literate cultures, a rock relief or rock-cut relief is a relief sculpture carved on "living rock" such as a cliff, rather than a detached piece of stone. While these relief carvings are a category of rock art, sometimes found in conjunction with rock-cut architecture, they tend to be omitted in most works on rock art, which concentrate on engravings and paintings by prehistoric or nonliterate cultures. Some of these reliefs exploit the rock's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Red-capped Plover
The red-capped plover (''Charadrius ruficapillus''), also known as the red-capped dotterel, is a small species of plover. It breeds in Australia. This species is closely related to (and sometimes considered conspecific with) the Kentish plover, Javan plover, and white-fronted plover. Description Red-capped plovers have a white forehead and underparts. Their upperparts are mainly grey-brown. Adult males have a rufous or reddish-brown crown and hindneck. Adult females have a paler rufous and grey-brown crown and hindneck, with a pale loreal stripe. The upperwing of ''Charadrius ruficapillus'' shows dark brown remiges (flight feathers) and primary covert feathers with a white wingbar in flight. Its length is 14–16 cm (5.5–6.3 in) and its wingspan is 27–34 cm (10.6–13.4 in); it weighs 35–40 g (1.2–1.4 oz). Breeding plumage shows a red-brown crown and nape with black margins. Non-breeding plumage is duller and lacks the black margins. Distribution and habita ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fairy Tern
The fairy tern (''Sternula nereis'') is a small tern which is native to the southwestern Pacific. It is listed as "Vulnerable" by the IUCN and the New Zealand subspecies is " Critically Endangered". There are three subspecies: * Australian fairy tern, ''Sternula nereis nereis'' ( Gould, 1843) – breeds in Australia * New Caledonian fairy tern, ''Sternula nereis exsul'' ( Mathews, 1912) – breeds in New Caledonia * New Zealand fairy tern, ''Sternula nereis davisae'' ( Mathews & Iredale, 1913) – breeds in northern New Zealand Description The fairy tern is a small tern with a white body and light bluish-grey wings.A small black patch extends no further than the eye and not as far as the bill. In the breeding plumage both the beak and the legs are yellowish-orange. During the rest of the year the black crown is lost, being mostly replaced by white feathers, and the beak becomes black at the tip and the base. The sexes look alike and the plumage of immature birds is similar t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
