I’m in the wonderful city of Charlotte in North Carolina, and later today I’ll present my paper updating our research into fire-spreading raptors in the Top End of the Northern Territory in Australia at the 2024 Raptor Research Foundation conference. Following are some of the highlights of my presentation. I last presented at the RRF [...]
Regular readers will know that I’ve been attending—and presenting—at various meetings of different ethnobiological and related associations over the past two decades, starting with Australasian Ornithological Conferences as far back as 2001 and (fairly) regularly at a variety of Australian and international meetings since then. COVID-19, work and a patch of ill health has prevented [...]
Photo: University of Arizona Recent news that the good folks at the University of Arizona’s Institute for Resilience have extended their Southwest Monsoon Fantasy Forecast game for a third year got me thinking about how a local fantasy weather competition based on Top End weather might work. After all, Australia’s Top End has—arguably—some of the [...]
While the settlers may have struggled to find a suitable name for Xanthostemon paradoxus, it is unsurprising that local Aboriginal language groups have no shortage of names—and uses— for this tree.
In Kaytetye country the Pelican is known as walaymperre, as in Walaymperre thangkerne alkenhe arntwe arenye, repe ware elpalhapenye kape arltere. Thangkerne nyartelepe aynenke aylperre kape pwele-pwele.
Ethnoornithology is the study of the relationship between people and birds, and in recent years the field has emerged as a valuable source of ethnobiological research. Ethnoornithology provides an opportunity to empower people of all cultures to discover, re-examine and preserve the connections between individuals, groups and cultures and the birds that they hunt, venerate and cherish.
A post that looks at our research into firespreading raptors in the Top End of Australia ... and beyond.
This is a re-post of an article first published in the February 2018 edition of Land Rights News (Northern Edition) by the Northern Land Council. Birds are closely connected to Wardaman culture. Many Wardaman dances have been adapted from bird movements and much Wardaman rock art depicts birds. […]
This has major ramifications for land use and conservation across Australia's northern savannahs and potentially beyond. Changed fire regimes by Europeans from those practiced for millennia by Aboriginal people wrought dramatic changes on the Australian landscape, a factor which imperilled (and continues to imperil) the existence of many native species. How do we account for birds as another potential fire vector?
In a broader sense, better understanding of avian fire-spreading, both in Australia and, potentially, elsewhere, can contribute to theories about the evolution of tropical savannas and the origins of human fire use.
