Many people thought Steve Irwin knew more about snakes than anyone else in Australia. But according to ABC TV Science program Catalyst Professor Rick Shine knows more about them than anyone else and like Steve he’s been passionate about snakes since he was a small boy.
Right now Shine is on a campaign to save the endangered Broad-headed Snake in south eastern New South Wales. It is thought there are only about 700 remaining in the wild with their habitat reduced by vegetation encroachment.
That’s right too many trees!
According to a paper published last year in research journal Copeia*, over the last two centuries European fire suppression practices have produced increases in vegetation density and canopy cover in many landscapes.
The researchers Jonathan Webb, Richard Shine and Robert Pringle hypothesized that this was negatively affecting populations of nocturnal reptiles that use sun-exposed shelters for diurnal thermoregulation including the Broad-headed Snake (Hoplocephalus bungaroides).
They undertook a field study in Morton National Park near Sydney and their findings supported the hypothesis. What they described as “modest canopy removal” restored habitat quality with rocks at the sites were the canopy was removed being 10C hotter and attracting more reptiles.
The paper concludes with the recommendation that until effective fire management measures are in place, manual sapling removal could help protect small populations of endangered reptiles including the Broad-headed Snake.
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This blog post remembers Steve Irwin who as Libby Eyre commented at an earlier thread: Steve will be saddly missed in the Australian wildlife community, as well as by the general public both here and overseas. He did a lot of good work for education, ex-situ breeding programs, in-situ conservation, animal husbandry and highlighting the animals many Ausralians couldn’t give a rat’s about. For all his larrikinism and sometimes over the top antics, he was a great spokesman for Australian wildlife. My thoughts are with his family, his friends and his staff at Australia Zoo.
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* Canopy Removal Restores Habitat Quality for an Endangered Snake in a Fire Suppressed Landscape. Copeia 2005 (4) pp. 894-900
Thanks to Ian Beale for sending me the Copeia paper.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
The same applies to all reptiles.
Back in 1996 I had a team of people hand weeding a young timber plantation and they reported two adult and 5 juvenile Death Adders in the one day. They were all sunning themselves in the small clearing around each seedling in a 5 hectare patch.
Due to a serious problem with wallabies biting the tops off the highly nutritious, fertilised, seedlings, we had allowed the surrounding weeds and grasses to grow-on to disguise them. But this overgrown environment was not condusive to the Adders, especially in early spring.
Needless to say half the team didn’t show up next day.
Endangered species losing habitit because of encroaching trees. A land managment issue. Trim back or cool burn the canopy to reclaim the habitat the species needs. Makes good sense.
While we are on the subject, some species need forest cover, some opem country, and some both. A mosaic landscape supports significantly more species than forest or just open country. It’s called the edge effect. Allowing canopy (including woody weeds) to overtake open country has to result in diminished biodiversity. Not good management.
As for the problem of people pinching the rocks the snakes need, well, I came to the conclusion some time ago that about half of all land managment is about people managment. Parks managing public impact, Governments managing owners of land supporting biodiversity, or landowners themselves managing public impact after being managed by Government!
Resoration of habitat is often the easy part. I wish Professor Shine’s efforts well.
Crap people management skills Ian?
I read a study the other day that says tree frogs can’t live without trees. Jeez, we’re in a real bind here…
Nah, Helen, I give em a job, let them get in touch with nature, and they ain’t got no damned gratitude.
Around my place it would be the Death Adders worried about exchanging body fluids with humans.
Typical half baked undergrad logic s2007168. The operative term is “excess trees” not all trees. And if there are too many trees then the competition between them dries out both soil and leaf moisture content. Exit tree frog.
Jennifer,
You ignore the fact that Prof Rick Shine also pointed out that people were stealing huge numbers of rocks from Broad-headed Snake’s habitat. To quote the Catalyst report
“Rick reveals the threats to their bush habitat in south-eastern New South Wales. The first is a lack of sunlight from vegetation overgrowth – something that Rick may be able to improve with permission put a low intensity fire through a small area of bush. However, there is nothing he can do about the second threat to the snake’s habitat – bush rock theft.”
Your post would have been more accurate and balanced had you not chose to ignore, or censor out, half the story.
Hey Mr Munn
Glad you could find out about snakes and bush rocks from the link I provided to the catalyst program.
But from memory bush rocks did not feature in the research paper which the catalyst program was based on, and from which I drew my inspiration for this post. I am not sure what empirical support there is for the bushrock hypothesis?
This of course is the tip of the bonfire in terms of the true state of much of our forest environs. Over-vegetated to the max. As highlighted by this study forest succession, the pre-cursor to catastrophic feral wildfire, is just as concerning and a serious ecological threat. We need more of these ecological truths reported on in this way. Well done.
We need the Greens to be made to talk publicly about such issues, not with door stop media releases but in-depth discussion, publicly with interviewers that know what they are doing. Someone like Andrew Bolt would be a fine choice as interviewer.
I note the authors of the report highlighted a few other species that suffer because of this gross mis-management, one being the Brush Tailed Rock Wallaby.
Interesting because it was not until 1998 that the so-called “recovery team”, for the BTRW, here in East Gippsland, admitted that wildfire was a serious threat to this species and this only came about after locals forced the “experts” hand via the letters section of our local paper, the Bairnsdale Advertiser. Unbelievable really, as they had been studying it since 1986. The wildfire/forest succession relationship is just so obvious to so many locals here. There was even a local group of people who ran a lobby group (1990) called the Bushfire Taskforce Inc. (now the Wildfire Taskforce Inc.), campaigning for dramatic increases in fuel reduction burning. Within this group were highly experienced bushmen and fire ecologists but somehow these blow in experts trying to “save” the BTRW ignored them. In fact BTRW ‘experts” even ignored a farmer for years that said he had them on his property. Scats the farmer sent in got lost in the mail (numerous occasions), he was ignored, until he walked in to their offices and personally delivered the poo, they tested it and agreed, “Mate you have BTRW on your place”. Dahh! Fair dinkum. Something smells and it ain”t wallaby crap.
Furthermore, I suspect the actual reason first highlighted as the “probable” cause of their initial and most dramatic decline, fur hunters, is a furphy. The landscape these species are found in is so rugged, rocky and steep that I have to wonder how they could have possibly achieved this back in the early 1900’s. This is some of the most rugged you will find in Victoria.
What the true cause of its initial decline, was more than likely the 1939 wildfires. Yes, WILDFIRE. This massive conflagration took out huge areas, where this wallaby would like to live. The damaged caused by the 1939 fires through these areas was far greater than that of 2003 fires. Huge tracts of land were completely crowned out.
In fact, getting off the point a bit more but if you look at the translocation plans for existing colonies of BTRW and the question of gene pool management, one who was skeptical might ask why they do not take a few hundred out of the Queensland population (10-20,000 population) and condition them for release down here in the South? The skeptic might say that breeding programs are a suspicious activity in some instances with people playing God within universities and other institutions and that the reports they write or support, are nothing more than self fulfilling prophecies. And of course they deal with science where the general public don’t go.
Further anomalies seem to exist with the BTRW. There seems to be this oversight type of thing happening within certain scientific networks.
A lot of this threatened species management stuff has been kept within very tight circles and they don’t like criticism.
Here’s a quote from a 2005 “consultation” paper titled, Translocation Strategy for the Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby in Victoria, by EnviroSense Consulting:
“Rock-wallabies will not often be found in the peer-reviewed or grey literature, but
rather in the minds of conservation biologists, scientists and land managers.”
I think we should be finding out what exactly else is in their minds.
Good post, Stewie.
For all the blame attached to land clearing as threat to habitat for threatened species, it is a simple and incontestable fact of history that no clearing in Australia, if not the world, has ever taken place at the scale, speed or intensity of the 2 million plus hectares of habitat destruction that took place in NSW and Victorian wildfires of 2003.
Habitat destruction through land clearing is widely dispersed, with single events taking months to complete, and at a greatly reduced intensity. And this enables fauna populations to migrate to other locations within the proximate area while still deriving some benefit from the cleared areas.
Often the ground covers remain intact with ants and ground dwelling species taking full advantage of the modified landscape. Many tree dependent species also continue to derive partial benefit from coppice shoots etc.
Few such ecological services remain after a wildfire. The few survivers must travel very long distances to find any food for weeks on end.
And all this culpable negligence is brought to us by the bimbecologists, in the name of intergenerational equity, no less.
Hi jennifer and Steve,
I’m pretty sure I have a paper on the bush rock issue/broadheaded snakes at work. Will dig it out.
Could someone please do a little back of the envelope calculation of the number of potential urban households, the number of bush rocks they might realistically collect, and the resulting number of hectares that will actually be impacted by this so-called threat to snake habitat.
My guess is that the sum total of bush rock collection is unlikely to exceed the equivalent to a thousand hectares of our 780 million hectares. And given the inherent laziness of the common bozo, most rocks would have been taken from the urban fringes, by a sequence of newly arrived homemakers, from land that was always next in line for housing subdivision anyway.
So while the rock collection may have an impact on snake habitat, it means absolute jack @#$% if that habitat is about to get paved into Barbie World with the full consent of the local council.
From Shine et al ‘The impact of bush-rock removal on an endangered snake species, Hoplocephalus bungaroides (Serpentes: Elapidae’ (1998) Wildlife Research 25, 285-195.
“The rocks removed by bush-rock collectors overlap considerably in size (diameter and thickness) and substrate (rock on rock) with those used by broad-headed snakes and velvet geckos…….In some sites, rock numbers were substantially reduced by anthropogenic disturbance. Thus, our survey data suggest that bush-rock removal has contributed to the endangerment of H. bungaroides.” The paper goes on to site other species that would be effected by bush-rock removal, and that other threatening processes are contributing to the decine of H. bungaroides.
One thing that was so spectacular to observe following the 2003 fires in many areas was the exposure of rocky landscape features. The same after Ash Wednesday around The Dandenongs in 1983.
Rocky escarpments, scree deposits, large bedrock outcrops, cliffs, boulder stacks, etc. were highly visible and observed as distinct features, unlike pre-fire where vegetation encroachment shaded/smothered these geological features.
Many species depend on this type of rocky terrain for habitat. We obviously have reptiles in lower elevations are common amongst rocky substrates, further up you will see the rock wallabies inhabiting large bedrock (cliff) environments, while on the top of mountains, above the snow line you have the (endangered?) pygmy possum living amongst basalt scree deposits.
With the report highlighting the broad-headed snake, its preference for certain heating properties to be present in its rocky habitat and that shading (due to over-vegetation) has drastically altered these properties, it really puts into focus the finer relationship between rock habitats and various other species that rely on it.
As mentioned above the pygmy possum, which lives high in the Alps is another species that relies on rocky substrates for housing and protection from the weather.
Pre-European settlement, the pygmy possum had regular visits into its country by the aboriginal tribes who were heading to the bogong moth ‘festivals’. Undoubtedly the aborigines burnt the country on the way, to aid travel and hunting, leaving many of the scree deposits around the mountains exposed at most times.
Since the passing of aboriginal burnings (and the probable extinction of local, large herbivore species) many of these areas became “scrubbed up” and we have had large catastrophic wildfires follow. On Mt. Hotham, where populations of pygmy possum exist the 1939, decimated the snow-gum forests.
As an example the snow gums which predominate parts of this country were (pre 1939) single large trunked, old and gnarly. Obviously very old (200-300 years old) but healthy. Following the 1939 fires they were totally crowned out, mile after mile after mile, the old trunks were killed and what is there now are multiple stemmed, octopus like trees that have coppiced from their lignotubers. The entire mountain sides were effected in this way. These fires (eye-witness reports) were devastatingly hot/intense and furiously fast.
What did this fire do to the pygmy possum populations? Why is there virtually no reference (using realistic historic potential/perspective) to this in any environmental management reporting, consulting or species/landscape scientific papers? And yet the authorities were made aware of this ‘line of inquiry’ decades ago by people who know these places like the back of their hand and some of these people, were in the 1939 fires. Why have these people been so obviously ignored?
And there are always interesting anomalies that pop up in modern management regimes.
The popularly presented population of pygmy possum on Mt Hotham is smack bang next to the ski resort (read tourist, read money).
Recently they kicked out the mountain cattleman from this country, to supposedly protect the environment but are now putting plans in to build a multi million dollar resort (town) on top of Hotham. These modern developers are permanently clearing the land, including the ski slopes themselves and one must wonder if any influences are coming to bear on ecological reporting/science so as to narrow areas of tourism potential for their (the developers/investors)? Is eco-tourism being driven by self fulfilling eco-prophecies?
Opps I have drifted, again. Um, the rocks.
The relationship between the thermal storage capacity of rocky landscapes and the reliance by so many species for a certain temperature regime to exist is profound, real and as the report on the Broad Headed snake indicates, many more species are in this basket.
The intellectual capacity of our environmental management agencies, I believe, has been seriously distorted (damaged) by the environmental movement’s political ambitions, starting in the 1960-70’s whereupon they designed themselves around slick media campaigning. Words to shock or capture the emotions. Fictitous presentations dressed up as fact. Pumping out words like fragile, pristine and preservation distorted the average person’s ability to put correct perspective on what they perceived many natural environments are really like. Often they are rocky, harsh, formidable and dangerous places. They are also over-vegetated. But such an angle doesn’t sit so well in the papers and the 6 o’clock “news”.
How would “over-vegetation” have sat, when ‘they’ were designing the Native Vegetation Clearing Act back in the seventies not to mention the wildfires that would result thereafter?!?!
Hey everybody out there in the suburbs, you have been conned. Not only does the heat need to return to the rocks but the heat needs to be put on the greens to fess up. How about some real environmental journalism/investigation in the mainstream media.
Ian Mott, thanks. As for the mathematics you suggest. That would be an interesting fact to chase up. A reality check.
I am new to blogs. Are my postings like this to long I wonder to myself? So much to say with so many issues inter-related.
Stewie, get amongst it. The fact that you are even reporting actual events renders half your post incomprehensible to half of the green movement. And the other half will just run your stuff through an ideological filter first and discard, or fail to retain, anything that does not reinforce their prejudices. Some para breaks and dot points might help the message but other than that go for it.
As for the significance of “rock theft”, lets work backwards. We have 7 million households of which about 25% are apartments etc with no room for rocks. The remaining 5 million homes are unlikely to have an average of more than 3m2 of bush rocks. Many will have none, the odd nutter may have 30m2 spread over 800m2 block. But this would make 15 million m2 or a total of 1500 hectares. Apportion this by state population and we would have 500ha from NSW’s 80 million ha, 450ha from Victoria’s 27 million ha and 300ha from Qld’s 170 million ha.
But as most of these rocks would have been collected from the adjoining bushland before it, too was developed, the 2 million households or 1.5 million detached houses of greater Sydney, built on 150,000 hectares of land, could get all their “rocks off” from only 500ha or 0.3 of 1% of the existing developed area.
The annual housing growth of 1% for NewSydGong would involve 50,000 households on 5,000 hectares and 150,000m2 of rock from 15 hectares.
So even if all bush rocks were taken from areas that have not been, or never will be, converted to housing, it would still not qualify as even statistically relevant, let alone as an environmentally significant activity.
Once again, the bimbecologists have disappeared up their own back yard in search of things to scare the kiddies.
Hi Ian,
First I would like to state that I have no problem with scientifically monitored, controlled burnings to prevent conditions conducive to out of control bush fires and creation of fire breaks.
Having got that out of the way, in view of your recent allegations about lack of rigor in environmental scientific studies, I find it odd that you are quite happy to get your bush rock figures from a mathematical model apparently constructed entirely in your head with no reference to actual data gathered in the field. Pot, kettle, black?
Your scenario also contains a glaring misinterpretation, you imply that the amount of bush rock collected is unimportant because it comes from areas which are in turn urbanised themselves.
If that were the case, surely the obvious question would not be whether bush rock collection is the primary cause affecting reptile habitat but the creeping urbanisation itself?
The scientific evidence appears to indicate that both are important factors.
‘The Broad-headed Snake does not persist in the face of urban development and the species distribution in the Sydney region has been greatly reduced. Aside from the loss of habitat through increasing urbanisation, the snakes survival in remaining bushland areas was threatened by removal of bush-rock for landscaping. This practice impacted on sheltering and foraging sites for the snake, and resulted in loss of habitat for its prey.’
– Australian Museum
Threats to the Broad-headed Snake –
‘•Bushrock Removal is occurring to
supply natural rock for gardens and other
landscaping (Krefft 1869; Hersey 1980;
Shine & Fitzgerald 1989). It results in
the loss of shelter used by the snakes
their prey – geckos and the geckos prey –
spiders and insects. Juvenile snakes are
almost totally dependent on small geckos
for food and so rock removal is likely to
reduce recruitment (Webb & Shine
1998b). Losses due to intentional killing
by bush rock collectors is also occurring
(Cogger et al. 1993).
•Loss of habitat due to urbanisation of
ridgetops is a serious threat (Krefft 1869;
Webb & Shine 1994). It results in
increased fragmentation and reduces the
species’ range (Cogger et al. 1993).
Individual snakes return to specific
locations and don’t seem to move large
distances (Webb & Shine 1998b). This
limits likely recolonisation of areas.
•Bushfire is thought to impact on the
snakes during summer when they occupy
tree hollows. Altered regimes have
reduced tree hollows and also impacts
on prey.
•Illegal collection of snakes by
unscrupulous herpetologists is suggested
as impacting on this species (Burbidge
& Jenkins 1984; Cogger et al. 1993).
Recent changes to reptile keeping laws
may result in a resurgence in interest in
keeping this species in captivity and so
increase pressure on wild populations.
•Forestry activities may disturb ridge
tops, creates access trails and removes
habitat trees. Trail creation increases
the likelihood of habitat disturbance by
opening up otherwise remote and
inaccessible areas.
•Disturbance – the species is thought to
be sensitive to incidental and/or
intentional disturbance to the surface
rock they utilise. Disturbance risk is a
function of the proximity of habitat to
roads and tracks (Goldingay 1998;
Newell 1998).
•Impacts of feral animals has been
suggested through predation by cats or
foxes and microhabitat alteration by
goats (Shine et al. 1998; Murphy 1996).
– Report on the Broad Headed Snake by the Threatened Species Unit, NSW National parks and Wildlife Service, September 1999.
The TSU’s concern over unscrupulous collecting of wild specimens would seem to be born out by this quote –
‘In Broad-headed snake areas, collectors often go along the tops of cliffs lifting only rock-on-rock exfoliations, and ignoring any others. Thus the maximum number of likely rocks can be lifted over a given period of time, even though this means much greater distances are travelled.’
– Raymond Hoser
The Reptilian Magazine, Volume 3, number 10, pp. 15-27 and cover, 1995.
Finally of course there is the question of how many endangered reptiles (particularly venomous ones) are simply killed and buried by Homo sapiens in urban areas, instead of getting the authorities to collect them.
Lamna,
This would be a species that I would challenge the use of the word endangered’.
The word ‘endangered’ draws attention to the species itself rather than an ecological threat, which in this case, is profound and destroys the overall ecology of entire habitats, that being the combined over-vegetation/wildfire (OV/W) threat.
By drawing so much attention to the species itself, an author is able to narrow down a report to highlight localized disturbances as a “serious threat” without quantifying how this sits in the overall population of the snake.
Urbanisation, rock removal and snake collector predation seem localized threats, probably a serious threat in some instances but nothing, I bet, compared to OV/W threat.
I have noticed in many flora and fauna reports I have read, over the last 15 years, that there is a tendency by many authors to put an over-emphasis on localized human-induced disturbances, while skimming over (like you did, when you so quickly got OV/W “out of the way”) serious ecological/species threats. So often OV/W threats, is THE ecological threat skimmed over in various species reports.
This seems to be the case with the report you cite and could be an indication that these authors are running personnel, discriminative, anti-human agendas. Some in the green movement want all human activity removed from ‘natuaral’ environments unless highly regulated (and costly) or involves themselves.
The running of “hair splitting” personnel agendas is causing serious ecological threats to become more serious.
Lama, here’s an exercise for you, if your interested. I realize you probably won’t bother and would rather read what you believe but…..
Find out when it was listed as endangered. Then try and get hold of all the population statistics at that point in time. Especially get hold of the field survey data. Compare what they new at this point and compare to total habitat area.
Don’t forget when analyzing field surveys, that the snake is a predominately nocturnal species.
Do they really know how many there are in total?
I suspect that if you did this you might behold the making of a self fulfilling eco-prophecy.
Of course the departments probably won’t give out that information these days, sighting ‘sensitive information’ due to it being endangered and that you may be a potential poacher. A convenient restriction for some in the bureaucracy, I’m sure, leaving us mere commoners to do the maths in our heads.
Hi Stewie,
Hmmm…..I agree with OV/W management and yet you still want to have an argument about it, sounds like a “hair splitting” personnel agenda to me.
Are you going to provide some genuine data to contradict the Threatened Species Unit report (which also cites a number of other scientific reports) or just regale us with conspiracy theories like Schiller Thurkettle?
Lamna, you did not address my post.
If you require evidence to support my assertions, this forum would not be the place, as it would take a few pages to fully put my case. People like yourself (I could be wrong) would declare this a cop out, however it is a fact. It would take a few pages.
The resources (time especially) are not available or more to the point will not be sacrificed, unless a public process is established, that is able to thoroughly examine and publicly present all points of view.
I confidently inform you, that if such a process was to exist, including equal access by all too judicial mechanisms, heads would roll. Amongst the heads would be a fair sprinkling of flora and fauna ‘scientific’ officers.
And you can read the previous para as, I am supremely confident. I have followed certain issues and people for years and have no doubt that they are running, for want of a better word, personnel agendas.
I have noticed the prevalent use of the word “conspiracy” by people these days,
in an attempt to cloud/divert the issue at hand. Like you did. A common word/tactic used these days to belittle a claim and put it in the ‘hollywood’ basket.
Sorry my friend, you are going to have to a lot better than that from now on.
Call it instead a corrupt network, that relies on scaremongering and pseudo science.
Many of us out in the real world, have had personnel experiences with this so called eco based/sustainable environmental management, that has revealed to us, a seriously flawed, corrupt and discriminatory state of affairs.
I used to think along the lines of, ‘conspiracy’ but now realise that there are relatively few of these hardcore green bureaucrats within the departments. The rest are followers, often to timid to question the veracity of management protocols, for fear of losing their jobs. Often new recruits have simply had no/little bush experience. Others are recruited at a young age, often with urban backgrounds, where soon they are caught up in the euphoria of ‘saving species’. Many (most) of the new recruits have little or no bush experience, rendering their ability of balanced perception, open to distortion by pseudo science.
Department staff have a plethora of pressures on them due to lack of funding and shaky employment tenure.
Laman. Go back and address my post and then why don’t you see if you can get a senior flora and fauna scientist to come on-line and discuss peoples concerns, especially the issue of pseudo-science.
Why are so many people, across Australia, from diverse backgrounds, coming up with similar themes of concern over claims of corrupt management/media processes? Why are there no public community processes available to address, in a thorough manner these concerns? Why are there so many un-published reports, within flora and fauna departments that rely on personnel communication with the scientific officer, effectively circumnavigating community input? I’ll repeat a quote from a consultation paper I sighted recently:
Translocation Strategy for the Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby in Victoria, by EnviroSense Consulting:
“Rock-wallabies will not often be found in the peer-reviewed or grey literature, but
rather in the minds (emphasis added) of conservation biologists, scientists and land managers.”
It’s in their minds, while the reports they write remain unpublished or non peer reviewed.
Do I have a personnel agenda? You bet. That is to protect our rights and our environment. I do not see these two things as mutually exclusive, unlike others. I prefer sensible management as the answer to many problems, not the “lock it up” mentality that has prevailed, until now.
Hmmmm.
‘If you require evidence to support my assertions, this forum would not be the place’ – Stewie
How very, very convenient for you, ‘cop out’ doesn’t even begin to cover it.
I think your claims that you have privileged information that you cannot/will not share with us are nothing short of McCarthyesque.
So thats a yes to regaling us with conspiracy theories.
If you think that merely repeating one quote lends your claims gravitas then sorry my friend, you are going to have to do a lot better than that from now on.
I’ll let you have the final say Lama.
Entertain me with your simple mind.
snakes are soooo cute!!i caught one the other day and it seemed pretty happy i let it go about another hour later!i’m just on this site because i have a school project!But one more comment: where is all the info on how to save the endangered snakes? i need to know this for my project, and i only have one day to do it!!??!!??
hey chrisie,
you really should not catch snakes they could die!!if you want more information go look on another website-no one here cares about your stupid dumb project!
yo0h are a buch of nerds lad
yesterday i found a snake and i hated the look of it soo i stabbed is that okk….i found this site very very boring and i think that u should stop learning and start swimming
i love the way you save snakes like mine