2024-03 Rabbit Sweep Action
Rabbit Sweep
- a BLG Rabbit Action Group Project.
This newsletter is for those interested in the development of a whole-of-peninsula rabbit control project. If you do not want to receive the newsletter, please let us know.
Rabbit Sweep Action - March/April 2024.
Attention!
we have two action events for which we would like your help.
Immediately: please help get your resources into our shared catalogue (see below)
On Wednesday, April 10: please come to the Bellarine Landcare's monthly meeting to discuss rabbits, strategies, and more with the Landcare group members (see below).
Catalogue
When landholders choose to act, they need to be able to do this according to their individual circumstances, skills, resources, etc. The Rabbit Sweep has found that although there are masses of information resources online to help these landholders, it is not obvious where they are, which are reliable, which might suit them but not others, .... So fixing this is a bit of what we will call low-hanging fruit.
Please help by entering your online resources into the catalogue of available resources that will be used to help landholders, wherever, find the resources that best suit their circumstances.
We would like to demonstrate this at the BLG meeting on April 10.
To enter your resources, simply fill in the form available at
https://testing.bellarinemac.org.au/index.php/rabbit-sweep-work/resource-library/resource- catalogue You can also enter useful resources you have found which are not yours, of course!
BLG Meeting - 6.30 pm, Wednesday April 10 - Mannerim Hall
Not everyone wants to be deeply into reading scientific papers but we all want to know what to do about rabbits and how best to do it. There is also oodels of experience, effective and useless, that is reported and will be of interest to us. The catalogue is about this problem.
But who is the 'we'?
One problem is how many people are part of the 'we'? In order to achieve out goals, we need to work with as many people and groups groups as possible to engage their help; we need to recognise that by working on rabbits we are simultaneously work on the feral cat and fox populations, and there is significant concern about our bio-security, so we want to achieve success as soon as possible (can we do it in say, 10 years?).
But right now, we have a lot to think about:
what is out goal? In fact, what do we want to achieve for the environment, taking into account how it has changed in the last 200 years. Do we have a shared vision?
How can we learn from the millenia of experience of those who lived here before colonisation?
Who can help control the destruction of our environment and give us pride in what we achieve? young people? children? it will soon be their environment but how do we engage them?
Is the biggest threat the invasive species (flora and fauna) or how we support them? Do 'shelter belts, for example, help or hinder sustainability? That is, are we planning and building a better future?
What is in the pipeline for pest control - what are the scientific breakthroughs of significance and when will they be available? Are we preparing for them appropriately, and possibly wasting our time with our old-fashioned means, or planning in a sustainable way?
The major problem we have, however, is engaging with many more landholders, encouraging them to work in their way on what are their responsibilities. There is a massive task to be undertaken and many many more people are needed to help.
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If you have news, ideas, queries, or otherwise, please feel free to share them. We are keen to hear from you at /
Please note that you can see and explore the Miro board on which Together Apart display what we are doing: https://miro.com/app/board/uXjVNDWlwJY=/?share_link_id=250805616819 The Miro Board items change as they are worked on. You can see the work by clicking in via Google etc or you can click 'sign up for free' and then 'sign up later'. There is a lot there so you may need to zoom out to see it (click '-' a few times to see it.
contact: rabbits @ Bellarinemac.org.au