Slipping Off Your Soapbox

A couple of very good friends (husband and wife), who live on a property just shy of Northam in Western Australia, told me they had very recently killed two large adult dugites. They would have killed a third had they not had their hands full dispatching the first two. The one that got away apparently disappeared under the house.

At this point was I: a) Angry, b) Sad, c) Disappointed d) wanting for some new friends.

The alarm was raised by the kids who were playing indoors and saw the snakes in the yard outside of their bedroom window. Shovels and rake in hand, like a scene out of Shrek, my usually warm, generous and empathic friends turned rabid and, in minutes, the snakes were compost; literally (see below)

At this point was I: a) Angry, b) Sad, c) Disappointed d) wanting for some new friends.

They went on to explain that, lately, they have been losing chickens (of the pedigree kind) and they had recently observed slide marks in and out of their chicken pen. Their property comprises 100 acres of pasture and dry sclerophyll woodland. They have a hay barn and all the other trappings one would expect lying around a hobby farm. They have created a utopia for venomous snakes that is, without question, better than the natural habitat within which a snake would usually reside. They invited the snakes into their 'built' environment and then they killed them.

At this point was I: a) Angry, b) Sad, c) Disappointed d) wanting for some new friends.

The answer to the above question is always going to be (b) or (c). It would never be (a) and, of course, it certainly is not (d). This is happening every day in urban and rural areas across the country. People are killing countless individuals of these keystone species of Australian Native Fauna; but what choice do they have?? 

Native fauna conservation advocates can jump up and down and kick and scream and yell as much as they like (and I am sure I will cop yet more abuse for this post) but these types need to accept that not everybody is alike and not everyone feels about snakes the way that we do. It would be amazing if we could provide 'round-the-clock' support to the general public, but we can't. The best we can do is the best we can do and that has got to be better thank not doing anything at all.

Luckily for our snakes, there is a private page on facebook called WA Venomous Snakes, which has 133 members and about 133 of them are clearly very passionate about Western Australia's least loved fauna. A very large chunk of these wonderful people will come and capture the snake that is giving 'Joe Public' a little bit of grief and take it somewhere safe where it will be released back into the wild. The don't charge (they may ask a donation); they do it for the love of the animal. Because they are volunteers they are not always available and not always immediately responsive to calls for their assistance. This is just a matter of circumstance. It is not ideal, but there is not really any scope for an alternative. 

Truth is, Joe Public DOES have a choice in MOST (but not all) circumstances. They can give the snake a chance; they can try to call someone. But they need to be patient and understanding. They need to realize these volunteers have jobs and families and commitments and will drop most of these obligations in second to come and rescue a snake. But sometimes they just cant get away.

Snakes in urban areas are on the increase because of the increase in urban areas and the increase in anthropogenic influenced prey sources (mice, rats etc etc). If you can't get a volunteer then do what you have to do. I just hope you never have to do it and so do the other 133 snake advocates in the Perth metro area.

For the Young Ones

From a fan (OK...from someone that saw me on TV): "i saw u on Natural Born Monsters and had a couple of questions on what degree in college would benefit in getting a job like yours".

Yes it is true: A uni degree or college degree IS the key to unlocking the door to CHOICE and choice is a powerful weapon for a young person to wield as they move along that dank, shadowy, fog laden pathway we call a Career.

To answer question posed, I did a Bachelor of Science with a double major in Zoology and Geography (GIS/Environmental Science). My heart was in the Zoology and Geography was more of an insurance policy to broaden my career opportunities post graduation. Sensible.....huh?

I actually went to University as a mature age student as I failed to achieve a high enough score in my Tertiary Entrance Exam to get into Uni!!! Please don't tell my children as it will shatter their wee perception of their Super Dad; I was a little bit of a misfit at High School.

Prepared to plunge myself into poverty for a "Piece of Paper", I had to give up full time work to go to Uni. Thus, I only intended to do the mandatory and minimum three year undergraduate degree in Zoology. But I loved it so much that I sucked the life out of university, rather than letting it suck the life out of me. 

I twisted, turned and manipulated my degree to suit myself. For example, Herpetology was run as a third year unit every second year and I just happened to commence Uni on the wrong year. So, not content to accept that I would miss out, I kicked and screamed like a child at the feet of the Head of Department until he conceded to let me into this third year unit even though I was only in my second year. I also crammed my second Major into the timetable of my primary Major so I could get the whole thing smashed out in three years instead of four. I graduated the double major within three years with a Distinction average proving you don't need to be no Rhode Scholar to do well, but you do need to love what you are doing.

I wanted more out of Uni than to just sit in lecture theaters or dissect toads. In my first year, I had heard that someone was doing research on my most favorite animal in the world: the Western Tiger Snake. As I was quite adept at handling venomous snakes I volunteered my services and from those weeks spent with French research scientists playing with Tigers I concocted the crazy plan to do my Honours research project in France. In Australia, Honours is all about learning how to do research and in the field of zoology there is a strong field/lab component to the research year. So I decided my field survey site was going to be Central Western France and the European Viper was going to be my study species. So off I went to France. Too easy (it actually wasn't but it was worth the pain).

The Honours project was awarded a First Class which, in Australia, is the Golden Ticket to getting an Australian Postgraduate Award scholarship. This was the ultimate prize as it was the 'artistic licence' enabled me to develop my own PhD project: the project I wanted to do!!!! 

I commenced my PhD in March 2001 and delivered the Final for assessment in March 2004. The Thesis, which employed ecophysiological techniques (renal, hormonal, behavioural, and physiological) to investigate how reptiles (Western Tiger Snake) survived in the absence of free water, was recommended for Distinction by two of the three reviewers and was thus awarded a Distinction.

So that is 'Academic Me'. How do I get to do what I do? The truth is that a college degree will only get you so far - passion will take you the rest of the way. 

Follow your passion and the career path will appear before you. All you have to do then is 'follow the yellow brick road, de dum, follow the yellow brick road........'. Eventually you will arrive at the Emerald City. My Emerald City is the vast expanse of tropical Northern Australia or the rugged offshore islands of the south where the people are few, deadlines don't exist and the snakes are plentiful.

#MentalHealthWeek2015

Just to be sure of something we already know, I jumped on the Uni library search engine to search scholarly articles on the role of animals in improving mental health. As anticipated I got hundreds of hits for journals and books across many disciplines (psychology, nursing, biology, vet science etc etc) on the positive influences of animals on people. The most common outcome of the animal/human interaction was an improvement in well-being, an increase in social connectivity and increase in accountability and responsibility among the test subjects.

It seems apparent to me that, based on what we do know about humans and the influence of cute and cuddly animals on their mental health it is all sweetness and light, fairies, rainbows and unicorns. But what if the animals are not cute, furry, cuddly and endothermic (warm-blooded)? Can the 'less well-loved fauna' have the same affect?

Moreover, there is one very important facet of mental health what is scarcely apparent in the published literature and that is the importance of that feeling of achievement and accomplishment on a persons self-worth.

If only there was an animal group that could not only boost the feeling of well being in humans but also amplify that feeling with a solid dose of accomplishment.

It has been quite some time since I have done a Venomous Snake Relocation Course and I have never, ever thought about the outcomes of the training from a mental health perspective. It just happened to be that this course was booked and then executed during Mental Health Week. 

Now, I have to be very, very, very clear and explicit here: this course had absolutely nothing to do with the improvement in the mental health of the trainees and I make no assumptions about their state of mind!! It's just that we had so much fun during the course, and due to the coincidental timing I started to look at training I do from a completely different perspective.

Fear, trepidation and introversion are a couple of the key traits that prevent people from truly experiencing the wonders of life. Unfortunately, some people stand so far back from the edge that they miss so much of the world around them. So when you bring a group of people together that don't know each other well, and you put them in a room with a bunch of reptiles you are bound to drag a few out of the cocoons within which they surround themselves. 

When those same people are nurtured through what is sometimes their very first close encounter with some of the world's most venomous snakes and then coached through techniques to manipulate and safely capture these snakes, the outcome for some is almost euphoric. 

I've been doing this for well over ten years now and, although I knew very well that the trainees were having a great time, I never once considered the net positive impacts that our least-loved fauna may actually be having on their mental health. 

Dining Alone

One of the first things that I really struggled with when I started working on remote mine sites and living in remote mining camps was watching people eating alone. Upon seeing such desperately lonely soles I very much wanted to grab the opportunity to wander over, pull up a chair and kick-start a bit of friendly banter. I possibly would have too, were I not constantly in the pockets of my work crew and they in mine. 

Lets be clear though: quite often these loners did not necessarily really look like they were wanting for company but, as a biologist, I know that humans are a gregarious bunch and a lone diner just looks to me like one of those bored and despondent primates in the old concrete and iron zoo exhibits that you just want to reach out and pat!

Strangely enough it did not take very long before I became one of those stoic and stand-off-ish primates buried in a bowl of minestrone soup, with mains, desert and a sweet late evening snack placed adjacent in the appropriate rank and file. It had got to the point where I very much preferred good food to bad company and I guess that is no real surprise. In the field the days are long and when you spend 12 hours a day with your colleagues you really don't want to spend your nights with them as well.

And then tonight, as I sat in the mess hall at Cape Lambert and looked around me a fog of lament and pity descended upon me. There I was, not too early for dinner and not too late, but very alone. This massive dining hall that only a year ago would have been a writhing, seething mass of mining personnel was a ghost town. That boom-time vibe and energy of wealth and prosperity that we  all became so accustom too, and consequently took for granted, has been extinguished by the great mining bust.

To those of you in that dining hall tonight there are two things you very much need to do; the first is rejoice the fact that you have a job and a wage to send home to your loved ones and then you need to drag all your tables and chairs together so you can enjoy each others company. Who knows how long it will be before all of us are dining alone by default.

An Educated Anomaly

By virtue of their scarcity many of our most endangered creatures are poorly understood. After all, it is pretty hard to learn about something if it is not readily accessible and available to study. The marsupial mole is a great example. On the flip-side some organisms are just so damn ubiquitous that nobody cares to understand them at all. It is a common paradigm in ecology: common is boring. Take the seagull for example: who would want to study that?

So there are very good reasons why we don't know everything about everything. But there are some things that are neither common nor rare,neither approachable or inaccessible, not secretive or extraverted and we don't know as much as we should know about them. That is because some creatures are just so damn complex that we have little or no hope of ever understanding what makes them tick.

One such creature is the Mining Site Environmental Advisor. This is an organism that, after reaching sexual maturity, actually consciously chooses to endure a further three years of  intellectual maturation and enlightenment before it intentionally immerses itself among a cohort of aggressors and antagonists where it will spend the rest of it's professional life occupying the lowliest niche in mine site ecosystem no matter how good it is at what it does.

In short, what we have here is an existential organism of moderate to high intelligence that chooses to put itself in harms way. This is completely counter intuitive and amounts to no less than 'flipping the bird' at Darwinism. How can the fittest survive if it throws it self directly in the path of an oncoming bus.

Over the coming blogs we are going to explore this anomalous creature in much detail and try and find out how this species manages to persist against all possible anthropological exigences.

Potty Mouth

Perhaps I am being a little old fashioned here but I assume that there would be somewhat of a social stigma attached to the admission that one uses ones phone whilst on the toilet. Perhaps it is normal practice for Generation Z, and possibly Generation Y.

Whatever the case, I believe there are bad practices and then there are behaviors that are much, much worse. From least worst to worse worst I propose the following hierarchy:

1)      Reading on line media on the throne.

2)      Checking your facebook status but not updating it.

3)      Checking your facebook status and updating it, but not specifically detailing what you are doing at the time

4)      Checking your facebook status, updating it with what your doing

5)      Checking your facebook status and then ‘checking in’, though I cant conceive that anyone would actually do that.

6)      Texting a friend

7)      Texting a family member.

8)      Answering your phone when it rings and giving a curt ‘I’ll call you back’

9)      Answering your phone while it rings and having a conversation.

10)   Answering your phone and having a conversation whilst on a public toilet in a row of cubicles that is clearly occupied by others (this literally just happened to me).

All of this is perhaps a little disgusting, but in there somewhere from 1 to 10 is quite likely something that you (and I) have done at least once or twice, whether we would like to admit it or not.

What are the consequences of such behavior? For actions 1-7, at worst, you might drop your phone. Survival case or not you know you are going to go in after it and from that moment forward, no matter how well you clean it, you will always be cringing when you put it to your ear and close to your mouth.
.

Due to the proximity of your hand to your face and the potential for the the transmission of bacteria, actioning item 8 – 10 could result in dire case of dysentery which may, in many less well developed countries, result in death. At this point I would ask you to consider who is less well developed: the populous of a country without mobile phones or the populous of a country that talk on their phones whilst taking a dump?

Whether you engage in any one of 1 - 10, or all of the above, you can only hurt yourself or audibly insult those in the next cubicle. But if you are using your phone on the plane you are putting my life in danger - or at least, that is what the Captain is telling me you are doing.. Whatever the case, I am not cool with that at all.

So next time you are on a plane think carefully about using your phone. You could be sitting next to me and if I see it I will forcibly extract it from you and post it down the porcelain express into excretory oblivion!

A Rose By Any Other Name

I don’t really recall why I was how I was, but I am pretty ashamed to admit that I used to be really quite embarrassed of my last name. I often wonder if my (now) teenage kids, Thing 1 and Thing 2, feel the same way? My wife took my last name as her own on our wedding day and I wince when I think about just how painful a decision that must have been to make!

A chronology: In kindergarten it was 'ladybug'. In primary school it was 'half lady half man'. In high school it was 'girly man' or 'lady boy'. The term 'hermaphrodite' was bounced around infrequently, but I think this one was was beyond the vocabulary dexterity of most of the morons that offered up the abuse. Post high-school the tide turned in my favour and 'Ladies Man' was what I seemed to hear most frequently, which I could live with. 

Beyond the usual school yard ridicule I did have to endure the torment of being summoned by my last name. In upper high I had a hard-ass, weathered old Phys Ed teacher who had a bad case of Short Man Syndrome. He only ever addressed me as “Oi LADYMAN”  which really got my goat; so much so that I actually fronted him on the issue. I won that battle but the war would rage on.

When I was contemplating enrollment in the Army Reserves, I anticipated with near certainty that Ladyman would be the tag by which I would known. Drill Sergeants would be barking it at 100 decibels and my buddies would beckon me by it in the trenches.

Oddly enough, the one place where I genuinely thought my last name would have locals in stitches was Thailand, but on both occasions when I have toured the country Ladyman barely raised a dry smile.

When I accepted the contract to work FIFO I did not consider, for one single second, how I would cope with people making mischief with the family avatar. I may as well have introduced myself as Ladyman, because my first name was given absolutely no regard and it really was not very long before every single one of my fluoro-infused colleagues were playing lingual twister with my last name.

It really was not a drama when it was coming from my blue-collar buddies on the front-line. We were spilling the same blood in the same mud and nicknames were terms of endearment. But when management started to chime in, I had to check myself. My sense of place was launched back in time and I found myself fuming like I did in those upper school Phys Ed classes. To my credit I summoned every ounce of intestinal fortitude, smiled a chipper smile and then turn the other cheek in the face of what many might regard as workplace harassment. But with every occasion that I turned my back to this antagonist, my ill will lifted and drifted further from me like pollen rising on a brisk spring breeze. 

It took only a few days for me to realise and fully appreciate that I was no longer at odds with my family name. In fact, I think I am pretty keen to fully embrace it. It is who I am and I am proud to be a Ladyman. 

As an aside, the origin of the name IS actually Ladies man or man servant to the Lady of the house. I can cope with either of those. 

My New LIFE-O as a FIFO

Do you remember, back in primary school, what it was like when you had a new toy that all the other kids wanted. Briefly your popularity would soar to heady heights and you felt an overwhelming sense of place: you were wanted, you belonged.

It lasted about as long as it took your 'friends' to tire of your toy. As quick as your popularity came, it went again. I recall one occasion when the most popular girl in primary school was my BFF for a whole lunch hour. Unbeknownst to me, Pac Man was her favorite game.

Being a consultant biologist in the mining industry is much like being a primary schooler with a Pac Man hand-held game machine. When you have what everyone wants (knowledge of the biological environment) and you are a dab hand at regulatory liaison you are every mining companies best friend. When  your client gets what they want and you are no longer required you fade into obscurity again.

NOW LET ME BE CLEAR - I am not complaining! I get paid to do what I do and I have many many wonderful clients that send me to fantastic places to do what I love to do - catch animals.

But sometimes I just feel like I just don't belong anywhere. As a consultant you never enjoy the warm embrace of a team and you virtually never get to spend a decent amount of time in any one place because, and rightly so, no body in their right mind is going to pay you a stupid amount per hour to have a holiday!!

Well all that is changing. After 20 years in the environmental consulting industry, working for small private companies, I am now a 'patched' member of a mid-tier mining group. I am loaded to the gunwales with FREE PPE and I am sitting here at the airport departure lounge among my 'hommies'. I don't need to know their names. I see their logos and they see mine. I nod and they nod back. I am part of a team: I have that sense of place I have so long desired.

Eight days from now I will be back in my office, sitting adjacent my beautiful, highly motivated and exceptionally talented wife (co-owner and co-director of APM Pty Ltd) and surrounded by the APM staff that I know and love. We have been spilling the same blood in the same mud in the wildest and most remote places for almost 7 years and we have a spectacular time doing it. I know they will miss me, but it is only 8 days. They will be fine.

Schizophrenia anyone?

Nauseatingly Good Fun

My brain pangs like somebody is scratching at it with a hunting knife via my left eye. 

Question 1 of 1 - What was the catalyst for my brain ache?

a) Fatigue

b) Noise

c) Inhalation of noxious fumes

d) Ingestion of an immense amount of dust

e) All of the above

Yesterday, I woke up at 0330 hrs anxious about the day that lay ahead. After floating around on net for a while I could wait no longer. I jumped in the ute, which I had packed and ready to roll, and hit the road. So in the zone was I that I missed a major turn-off, wasted 15 minutes recovering and then proceeded down the wrong highway to my first ever motocross event. I wasn't going the wrong way, just not the best way and making it to scrutineering on time was looking like it was going to present some challenges. Two hours later I arrived. On my arrival I came to unsettling realisation that I still had to drive for another two hours to get home after a whole day of racing.

The Hotham Valley in Western Australia is both tranquil and idyllic. Fat lambs graze and frolic midst the long green grass and horses stand staunch yet peaceful against a backdrop of heavy early-winter fog. On any Sunday, if you listen carefully you can hear absolutely nothing other than the whistle of the old steam-driven Hotham Valley Tourist Train cascading through the valleys; but not today.

Today, at 9:45 six classes, comprising at least 150 riders, lined up at the starting gate to embark on their sighting lap for Round 1 of the Trail and Enduro Motodynamics Natural Terrain Motocross, sponsored by the ridiculously cool guys at Moto Dynamics. The noise was epic, resonating through the valley like the Tabernacle Choir: the 150 two strokes screaming like children at the treble end of the vocal spectrum and the thundering KTM500EXC growling out a bass baritone and making it's presence felt. It may well be that, what started as a choral suite, became acoustic carnage on my brain by the end of the day causing my current cranial anguish.

I am not a smoker, but I am pretty sure that if I was one I would choose not to inhale Motul 2-stroke Special Light. We have all seen the old Quit smoking add where the man wrings out the sponges and squeezes the tar into the jar. I am pretty sure those sponges quite accurately represent what my lungs looked and felt like by the end of the day. Of course we all know that when your alveoli are choked with hydrocarbons you feel a little lite-headed and a migraine is sure to ensue.

When practice commenced we had four minutes to comprehend what lay ahead of us that day. That was about the time taken to complete a lap behind the Safety bike. The circuit I traversed was not the circuit on the brochure!! I was of the understanding that Natural Terrain Motorcross comprised a nice long flowing flat track through soft and squishy grassy pastures, with loamy, clayey dirt that would feel like mousse when you landed face-first into it. I was hoping that the corners would be bound by warm fleecy sheep ready to absorb your impact when you were high-sided off your bike out of a corner. Moreover, as the race was down south and it was the middle of winter I expected the ground to be moist and the horrible dust we endure during summer rides would be replaced with blissfully soft little bundles of sweet smelling freshly turned earth. Wrong again. To get some appreciation please do yourself a favour and watch this clip.

Having considered the events of the day, my answer to multiple choice Question 1 is (e) All of the above.

Dreaming Up A Mid-life Crisis

Google 'dreams' and 'meaning' and you will be buried under a bazillion 1s and 0s of digital diatribe, with all manner of people (academic and otherwise) claiming to have the answers on what each and every dream means. I don't doubt that some, many or most of their answers have some fundament, reason or logic but I believe the catalysts for our dreams and the way the dreams play-out is unique to every person and every dream that person has.

Most often I find that my dreams are some twisted take on events that are going on at the time: for me the dream is usually the complete opposite of reality. Take last night for instance.

I dreamed that I was coming home from primary school (as an adult [i.e. the age I am now]) walking among the kids pointing out all the things that had changed in the neighborhood on the way home. I cautiously acknowledge that I was not walking, but trundling along in something that resembled a mash up between a wheel chair and Green Machine (if you remember those you are about my age). The explanation for my mode of transport is simple: I saw one the other day and I am probably not long out of a wheel chair.

The school crosswalk experience was surreal and tranquil, so much so that all the kids around me were espousing quite eloquently how pleasant the experience was (that was weird!). The white lines and bright orange flags were replaced by a giant and very robust looking boom gate and a ridiculously chilled-out, almost drone-like YOUNG bloke was in attendance. This is the polar opposite of the twice-daily cross walk experience I remember; dozens of hyper kids jostling at the road side like greyhounds ready bolt when the whistle screams the signal to go, and the poor geriatric on the flags and whistle being all but mowed down by the throngs of screaming kids anxious to dump their bags at home and run off to play until sunset. All the while the geriatric crosswalk attendant feigning his expressions of concern, authority and responsibility for our safety.

I think that Old Man Mitch dreaming of trundling home from Primary School is my acknowledging what seems to be a perpetual Mid-life Crisis. Why now? Why last night?

By the end of this week I will have experienced two things that I have never done before. The first is Competition Trampolining. I have a trampoline, but compared to a comp tramp it is like jumping up and down on the roof of a convertible (i.e. bouncy but not really really really bouncy). Why am I trampolining all of a sudden? It is because my Acro students are starting to catch up with me; they can do nearly all of the tricks in my repertoire and I need to learn some more....STAT!. So expect future blogs on broken bones and strained muscles as I attempt tricks best left to the young and bendable. 

The second event is competitive motocross. Some say this is super dangerous and probably not a good sport to try for the first time at the age of 40something. All I can say is that at least all the bikes are going in the same direction at roughly the same rate. As a recreational trail rider, I make it my business to know the risks I face and, out there in the bush the biggest killer of recreational riders is other recreational riders coming the other direction at the same speed.

See you all in Triage! (I'm the guy in front BTW, but you get the idea).

Eat my dirt!

Sometimes when you ride trails your momentum is symphonic and your body moves in harmony with your bike. Your bike performs as it should; just as it did the day it rolled off the show room floor. Your senses become heightened and your mind's eye enables you to transcend the obstacles immediately in front of you and you feel as if you know what is around the next corner long before you get there. You develop somewhat of a sixth sense which facilitates a relaxed response and subtle reactions to whatever is coming your way at great speed. But it is not always so.

Sometimes, despite your best efforts to the contrary, you demonstrate all the competence and composure of a train wreck. Instead of using the perturbations in the trails to propel you from one corner into the next, those same perturbations seem to just propel you from one obstacle into the next. On days like these there are a number of things you should remember. Your bike weighs about 115 kg and the crushing force caused by inertia increases exponentially with an increase in speed. Though the sand, loam or clay on the track may be soft like a baby's bum, the underlying sandstone, quartzstone, granites, bauxite or ironstone is neither flexible nor malleable. Tree trunks are immobile and fallen logs are very cryptic. When you ride you paint a target on your back and you invite any and all of these exigences to take you out.

When we are having a good ride, we feel like we are pretty accomplished riders. We don't crash very often and we feel like we cut a pretty quick pace through the scrub. We have been doing it for a while, we have all the right gear and we pilot pretty decent bikes. It would be safe to say that, for the most part, we are satisfied with our own ability.

And then it happens: we cross paths with a couple of other riders that look the same as us, ride the same bikes that we ride on the same trails that we ride; but they ride so very much better than we do. It shouldn't be humbling or disheartening, but it is.

Riding a tight twisty single track in Mundaring just recently my buddy and I were pulled over track side when two such riders came upon us. We chatted for a while exchanging trail tales and bike settings, We sniffed around each others machines like dogs smelling each others backsides. I took them to be no different to us in any way; as riders I did not anticipate their being any better or any worse than us because, in our minds, we are good enough to be average and average enough to be good. I could not have been further off the mark.

When they launched away from our track side pow wow I shot off in hot pursuit. I felt my light, agile KTM Freeride was easily the bike most suited to the trail we were riding and I felt like I was riding well. Thus I imagined myself nipping at their heels for as long as I felt the desire to put the wind up them. I could not have been further off the mark.

They vanished. It was like Blair Witch. Within meters, along the thinnest and most contorted single track a dirt bike was capable of negotiating these two guys literally vaporized. It was only that the shrub was impenetrable in every other direction that I could even conceive they had disappeared along the very same trail I was on. The only evidence of their presence was the faint odour of four stroke exhaust and freshly turned soil.

From this encounter I conclude the following: the ability to be a good rider is solely dependent on only one thing; a complete disregard for self-preservation. As to how these guys, and girls, can function like this with a helmet on and then function normally in society with their helmet off is beyond me, but I admire them for it.

This little log hop could be considered a rather skillful maneuver, but the track marks left by those two riders that went before us suggest that they did not even slow down to consider how they would negotiate this obstacle. Respect!

 

Are You F@#&Book'n Serious?

Hands up if you woke up to this this morning?

I did and I found it rather distressing. Now we all know what happens when young people have their phones confiscated or get banned from social media; they throw a massive 'tanty', stamp their feet and hurl a tirade of abuse at the confiscatee. Despite being 42 years of age, I feel like doing much the same thing.

First I thought it was a scam, so I logged out and logged back in several times on several devices. After a while I concluded that it must be legitimate.

Then I clicked proceed and went to the first window which requested A PHOTOGRAPH OF ANY ONE OF MY MOST GENUINE PIECES OF I.D. Seriously? They want me to take a photo of my Birth Certificate and post it on social media? It would have been quicker to post my bank Login and PIN number!

With my blood pressure rising, I begrudgingly took a photo of my drivers licence, uploaded it and clicked Submit. I had convinced myself that this was for the greater good. What made the process more palatable was the thought of all those fraudsters and pedophiles out there that are only days away from losing one more medium through which they exploit the innocent.

So like a good social media citizen I ticked all the boxes and now I am back on Facebook right?

Wrong!!!

A message popped up to tell me that Facebook will get back to me when they are satisfied of the integrity of my I.D. They won't even allow me into my account in the mean time. It is 5am in the goddamn morning on a Saturday; what the hell else am I supposed to do???? Watch a sunrise?.

If I have this little control over my chosen social medium, maybe it is time to Log Off for good?

You Could Be Your Worst Enemy's Best Friend - Conclusion: Batman and Robin

Apologies in advance but if you don't read Part 1 and Part 2 then Part 3 is going to make no sense at all! Mind you, starting in the middle of the story did not seem to influence the popularity of Star Wars. As it annoys the crap out of me when Reno Rumble, My Kitchen Rules and I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here repeat 75% of the story to date after every advertisement break (treating the audience like they are goldfish), I simply refuse to do it here. Suffice to say that it involves a planigale, a quoll and a toad (NB - no animals were harmed in the making of this blog). Oh........and a rat.

.....just give me a second as I flick back to Part 2 to see where I left off (goldfish syndrome).........Ok, here we go.

So, let us assume that the population of Northern Quoll on Koolan Island will be somewhat buffered from obliteration when the Cane Toad arrives by virtue of their smaller body size and their tendency to prey on smaller, less toxic toads. What this means is that there is at least some hope for the population.

Enter the hero (actually heroes) of our story: Planigales and Rock Rats.

Planigales are surprisingly smart, proving that intelligent things come in small packages. Recent studies by Llewelyn et al. (2010) and Webb et al. (2008) have shown that very few planigales die after they attack toads and that the survivors rapidly learn that toads are best avoided. Moreover, planigales living in areas where toads are present may actually develop a resistance to toad toxin.

Now dasyurids, including the Planigale, are known to be boom and bust breeders and that means that under favourable conditions their numbers can explode in a single breeding season. A massive reduction in predation pressure is definitely a catalyst for a population explosion and this is exactly what will happen when the Cane Toad arrives. The quoll population will have the snot knocked out of it, and the Planigale population will explode.

For the small number of quoll that do survive the toad invasion this should result in a buffet of food available to them for which they will not have to work very hard to acquire. As the quoll is also a Dasyurid, it has the same capacity to boom or bounce back in response to a rapid increase in prey availability.

Lingering around just left of centre stage is the Rock Rat, Zyzomys argurus. Based on the very recent work of Cabrera-Guzmn et al. (2015) at least three species of native Australian rodents, normally described as herbivorous, have been shown to actively pursue and prey on Cane Toads with no ill effects. So it is very likely indeed that the Rock Rat should be no different.

So, like Batman and Robin, the Planigale and the Rock Rat are going to come to the rescue of the Koolan Island Northern Quoll by combating (Bammmm...Powwww....KaPlunk) and consuming (Sluuurrpp, Shhhlllllooolllooooppp) the Cane Toad. Then they are going to make lots and lots of babies (I always wondered whether there was more to the relationship between Batman and Robin) due to the reduction in predation pressure from the decimated quoll numbers.

The heroes of our story: The Planigale and the Rock Rat

The newly abundant prey will then be the catalyst for a bounce back in the quoll population, , Coupled with the quoll's own capacity to learn to avoid toads, the population will be back to a new stable equilibrium in no time!

Presently, we view Koolan Island as a island ark, somewhat safe from the invasion of the Cane Toad as its population spreads west through the Kimberley. We anxiously await news on the toad front at the end of each wet season. They are in the Fitzroy River catchment now, which flows out through Derby and around the islands of the Buccaneer Archipelago, within which Koolan Island is located. One big flood and toads will spill out into King Sound and it is inevitable the individuals will wash up on the shores of Koolan Island.

Toads strategizing their invasion on Koolan Island

But I am not worried! I think, thanks to the planigales, the rock rats and island dwarfism, I reckon they will be fine. Thoughts?

References.

Cabrera-Guzmn, E., Crossland, M.R., Pearson, D., Webb, J.K. & Shine, R. 2014, 'Predation on invasive cane toads (Rhinella marina) by native Australian rodents', Journal of Pest Science.

Hayes, R. A., M. R. Crossland, M. Hagman, R. J. Capon, and R. Shine. 2009. Ontogenetic variation in the chemical defences of cane toads (Bufo marinus): toxin profiles and effects on predators. Journal of Chemical Ecology 35:391-399.

Llewelyn, J., J. K. Webb, L. Schwarzkopf, R. Alford, and R. Shine. 2010. Behavioural responses of carnivorous marsupials (Planigale maculata) to toxic invasive cane toads (Bufo marinus). Austral Ecology 35:560-567.

Webb, J. K., G. P. Brown, T. Child, M. J. Greenlees, B. L. Phillips, and R. Shine. 2008. A native dasyurid predator (common planigale, Planigale maculata) rapidly learns to avoid toxic cane toads. Austral Ecology 33:821-829.
    

You Could Be Your Worst Enemy's Best Friend - Part 2: The Quoll

So how is it that the poor planigale can be the best friend of it's worst enemy? We are getting there (I promise), but the scene must first be set.

Teaser: I believe that the planigale is to the Koolan Island Northern Quoll what Will Smith was to the citizens of New York. A glimmer of hope at the dawn of the Cane Toad apocalypse. As we all know, it is always darkest before dawn. Before the hero (Mr Planigale) can rise up and save the innocents (the quoll) many hundreds of those innocents will perish; slowly, painfully.

News Flash: Quoll populations have been decimated as a result of their predation on Cane Toads since Day 1 of the toads introduction into Australia. Quolls are relatively big, hungry predators that have an insatiable appetite. They eat toads and they die. You don't have to dig too deep to bury yourself under mountains of literature supporting this statement. In fact, you should check out the work of the Shine Lab; it is freakin' awesome.

Background: Cane Toads have not caused the extinction of any species of Australian native fauna, but they sure as hell have given local populations of certain species, such as quoll, a bloody good dose of 'what for' and then some. Despite the reality that localised extinctions of some discrete populations of some species are probably far more common than we know, the fact remains that Cane Toads have NOT wiped out entire Australian native species across the entirety their distribution.

Like most of our wily and highly evolved  native fauna, the Northern Quoll is not stupid and it is a survivor.

Back to our story.......

Cane Toad eggs have lots of poison and big toads have a lot of poison (Hayes et al., 2009). So if you are going to eat Satan's line backers (big ugly adult Cane Toads) or the spawn of Satan (the eggs) you are in real trouble. Quoll don't eat the eggs, but because of their size, ability to subdue prey and their need to feed adult quoll will tackle adult toads and they die as a consequence.

You don't need to be a rocket scientist to appreciate the fact that the biggest Quoll will take on the biggest Toad if it thinks, but for a second, that Mr Toad is going to be an easy, wholesome meal that won't put up too much of a fight. As an extension of that, you don't need to be brain surgeon to understand that smaller quoll will tackle smaller toads.

The tremendous advantage that Koolan quoll have over their mainland conspecifics, in the race to survive the invasion of the toad, lies in their morphometrics. Mainland Northern Quolls can weigh up to 1.2 kg, with the males (400 to 900 g) being larger than the females (300 to 500 g) (Braithwaite & Begg 1995). On Koolan Island males average only 548g and females average 298g. Let me put that into perspective visually. The first photo is a 200grm female and the second photo is a 900grm male. You can see the size difference and you can imagine the marked difference in the size of the toads each of these two quoll would tackle.

So for those of you that are still with me you will immediately recognize that Koolan quoll will have a much better chance of surviving a Cane Toad invasion because the quoll themselves are smaller and therefore the toads that they will attack and eat will be smaller and therefore less poisonous. Many will die, of course, but many may not and there is a bucket load of literature out there supporting the idea that savvy quoll will quickly learn to avoid toads if they manage to survive their first encounter. It is those savvy quoll that will continue to procreate in spite of the Cane Toad apocolypse that will descends over Koolan Island like a cloud of lead laden dust.

Enter Mr Planigale.....the real hero of this tail.



References:

Braithwaite, R. W. & R.J. Begg (1995). Northern quoll Dasyurus hallucatus Gould, 1842. In: Strahan, R., ed. The Mammals of Australia: National Photographic Index of Australian Wildlife. Page(s) 65-66. Sydney: Reed Books.

Hayes, R. A., M. R. Crossland, M. Hagman, R. J. Capon, and R. Shine. 2009. Ontogenetic variation in the chemical defences of cane toads (Bufo marinus): toxin profiles and effects on predators. Journal of Chemical Ecology 35:391-399.

Webb, J. K., G. P. Brown, T. Child, M. J. Greenlees, B. L. Phillips, and R. Shine. 2008. A native dasyurid predator (common planigale, Planigale maculata) rapidly learns to avoid toxic cane toads. Austral Ecology 33:821-829.

What did Mick want?

When I was only about 21 I was caught up in a peculiar and embarrassing situation involving Mick Malthouse. 

At that time I played with venomous snakes and rode motorbikes (not much has changed). I didn't care much for football and I was actually really quite crap at it. In relative terms, I would not have known Nic Nat from Andrew Fyfe.  

I also looked like a bit of a 'unit' as I was a 'wannabe punk' with a disastrous mop of tangled mange on my head and more piercings than was aesthetically practical. Why a stranger would want to talk to me I will never know as, based on first principals, anyone's first impression of me would be that I must be a bit of a dickhead.

Whatever the case, I was at the launch of a new 'high end' real estate development in Maylands (an inner suburb of Perth, Western Australia) where, during the land reclamation, remediation and development process I had been responsible for the capture and relocation of long-necked turtles. I must have earned an an invite to the swoiree only to boost numbers. That being the case they must have been scraping the bottom of the barrel because I was hardly the pin-up boy for inner-city urban executive living.

During the day this chap sidles up to me (perhaps because I was looking a little out of sorts) and starts shooting the breeze. He was really very pleasant and really trying hard to make conversation; he was so damn personable it was not funny - like he had known me for ages but I had not one clue who he was. Whilst talking to him I was certain that he was the owner of the environmental consulting group (Alan Tingay of Alan Tingay and Associates) that I was under contract to, so our conversation was a little disjointed and quite confusing. 

He was asking me (someone who clearly had barely two cents to rub together) whether I would consider buying a house in this estate?????? I was asking him how business was going and what the prospects of future land development projects were. It was a little awkward to say the least, but he must have known in an instant that I had confused him for someone else. But he did not break stride and was not put out one iota. He just kept being nice to me - a nobody. 

When he wandered off a colleague asked me "what was I chatting to Mick about?". 

So with all the pressure that this poor guy is under now, I want him to remember two things: 1) I dont give a stuff about football and 2) he is a bloody nice guy and I don't care how bad his footy team is because I will remember him for his humility not his ability.

You Could Be Your Worst Enemy's Best Friend - Part 1: The Planigale

I roused late one night and my mind too quickly escaped the restraints of fatigue; within seconds I was wide awake and I knew it was going to be a long night.

Immediately, my brain was a mangled mess of ecological questions without answers on the topic of island biogeography. I guess this should come as no great surprise because I was on an island and I was studying aspects of biogeography; I was doing the annual quoll monitoring survey on Koolan Island with Animal Plant Mineral.

That day I had caught a Planigale. Though I never tire of seeing these very cool little critters, a long-tailed planigale is not what I would normally consider a significant collection. However, on Koolan Island its capture was a somewhat special event.

Planigales are the tiniest of tiny (10grms) little dasyurid marsupials; not the smallest, that is the Pilbara Ningaui. They look like little mice but they have cat like teeth and they are ferocious predators with an insatiable appetite for almost all invertebrates and any small vertebrates that it can subdue. They have a metabolic rate that could power a small village. They are super cool tiny little Tassy Devils, if you like.

On Koolan Island we never catch Planigales. We have done hundreds upon hundreds (even thousands) of trapping nights (pit traps, funnels and pit traps) and from 2004 until today only four individuals have ever been captured, including this one. 

Within their known distribution they are not normally uncommon. So why are they such a rarity on Koolan Island? The answer lies in the belly of a close relative - literally. At nearly 50 times the size of a planigale the Northern Quoll tears the heads off live Planigales, eats them from the inside out and picks its teeth clean with the femur bone. 

It would be a gross understatement to say that the Northern Quoll is the Planigales worst enemy. But things may be about to get a whole lot worse for Mr Planigale. With the coming of the Cane Toad Mr Planigale may be the Northern Quoll's bestest friend and with friends like the Northern Quoll, who needs enemies????????

Read Part 2 of this blog to find out why.

References:

Hayes, R. A., M. R. Crossland, M. Hagman, R. J. Capon, and R. Shine. 2009. Ontogenetic variation in the chemical defences of cane toads (Bufo marinus): toxin profiles and effects on predators. Journal of Chemical Ecology 35:391-399.

Webb, J. K., G. P. Brown, T. Child, M. J. Greenlees, B. L. Phillips, and R. Shine. 2008. A native dasyurid predator (common planigale, Planigale maculata) rapidly learns to avoid toxic cane toads. Austral Ecology 33:821-829.

Blogging Off

In 380 days I have posted 97 blogs on www.solucky2balive.blogspot.com.au.

So Lucky 2B Alive is teetering on just under 10, 000 reads, which is not a lot but is not insignificant. I am pretty proud of the fact that this is an organic growth in readership which I have not paid any money to promote through Facebook etc etc.

I have written over 50, 000 words with each of my stories fully annotated with pictures and videos.

I just got offered my own personalized URL at Google+ as my Google+ site has been hit over 42, 000 times (Mitch Ladyman Ink) https://plus.google.com/u/0/+MitchLadymanInk

Why do I do it? Because it is bloody good fun. Typing is cathartic - I don't know how or why? Your fingers move like lightning and stuff appears on a page. Thoughts, actions, intentions. It appears on screen and, in one click of the save button, I have memories locked away safely among a jumbled cloud of electrons, dots and dashes somewhere up there in cyberspace.

Am I a narcissist? I hope not. I think I definitely was when making the Snake Whisperer videos a few years back. But these days my stories are not meant to be a 'look at me, look at me' and I hope that no-one interprets them in that way. They are about what I do and where I go and what I see; this this is the only content I am qualified to write about as I am not cultured or worldly enough to comment on other people's lives or politics or global issues.

I do hope my stories entertain. Perhaps they may provide some amusement for someone who is unfortunate enough not to be able to get out and about to see the natural world; someone who is incapacitated by injury or ill health. Maybe someone who is a little too poor to afford a plane ticket to Kununurra, Broome, Brisbane or even put enough fuel in their car to drive out to the goldfields may enjoy a story or a video depicting a stellar sunset over red earth, a campfire and endless open mallee woodland.

Who knows? My stories may even inspire one or two budding young biologists to crack on through their ASIC exams so they can get into uni and do Zoology or Botany or Geography or Conservation Biology or....or.....or.......or........... If so, that would be a bonus.

The big question now is where to from here? Every time I log onto Facebook I see the 'Promote Page' icon on the left of my screen and I think to myself, should I? Or is that 'selling out' - buying a fake audience that will have to ingest my digital diatribe as it is rammed down it's social media throat.

Or is it opening up my work to a wider audience who actually may enjoy reading it.

This is a problem; a quandary. Whilst contemplating a conclusion to my query, enjoy this video that shows how a Northern Quoll gives us the middle finger on a recent survey. It just goes to show there is a simple solution to every problem.

Quollunteers

The mining industry lays gasping on the canvas trying desperately to, at least, rise up to it's haunches before the 8 count. Some of us have had it so great for so long and I have most certainly not lost sight of that. But I feel truly and desperately sorry for those young graduates out there that can't find work in this industry at the moment. Being a consultant biologist really does enable one to get out there and get down and dirty with the Australian native flora and fauna.

It is very easy for we, the older generation, to say 'too bad so sad - what is happening to you happened to us when we were your age'. It still numbs my mind to think that when I graduated high school in 1990 there were no jobs and you had to be some sort of child prodigy to stand any chance into getting in to a decent sandstone uni. In fact it was so bad that the enrollment queue at Mt Lawley TAFE resembled a ticket sale sleep-out for a 1D concert.

But this is not another rant ragging on the so-called 'me me me me' generation so a big 'up yours' to anyone who was expecting it to be so.Rather, I want to take up some of your time to thank a couple of fantastic volunteers that have, very recently, departed our current survey on Koolan Island in the Kimberley, Western Australia.

Koolan Island is a pretty groovy place that has been the site for high grade iron ore mining for years and years. BHP picked over it for many years and actually had a village on the island where the miners and their families lived!! Then Aztec had it and now MGI is mining it; or at least they were until that pesky sea wall gave way and the main pit became the blue lagoon, minus Brooke Shields. Koolan Island has been in the paper very recently as they want to turn the mine waste dumps into an airstrip and make the island a logistics hub for the oil and gas industry (Koolan Island Logistics Base), which I personally think is a very very cool idea indeed.

For years Animal Plant Mineral have been on the island undertaking the annual Northern Quoll monitoring. The survey comprises Elliot Box Trapping of 400 trap sites for five nights in a row. We catch a lot of quoll. In the morning we clear and close traps, during the day we process quoll (measuring morphometrics and recording sex and reproductive status) and in the late afternoon we re-bait and re-set traps so we can do it all over again the next day. 

It is one of those jobs that, if you considered only the mechanics of the tasks at hand, it is not dissimilar to working on a factory floor - you do the same thing day in day out and there is not a lot of scope for surprises. But if you are a biologist with an acute sense of self and an appreciation for ecology and the natural world that surrounds you, then I swear there is no place you would rather be. This is what the office looks like in the morning (tide out) and the afternoon (tide in), respectively.

Quoll have teeth and they bite, but so what? Quoll have a big appetite coupled to a fast digestive system and a turbo-charged metabolism so that means they crap constantly and when they have been eating bait (peanut butter, rolled oats and tuna) their turds stink. I personally loath setting and checking Elliot traps as it is so monotonous.Elliot traps are to me what stairs are to a geriatric with chronic rheumatoid arthritis; a pain in the ass but important in getting through the process from A - B.

Despite all of this I knew very well that when I put the call out for volunteers the first people I approached would immediately and without hesitation jump at the chance to get shat on and bitten by one of natures little wonders. These guys are so feisty and animated that handling and working with them never ever gets dull, but what made a great job even better is the unabated enthusiasm of our two volunteers. These guys (they were actually girls) are not recent graduates trying to improve their Curriculum Vitaes for future job applications; they were young professional biologists that simply wanted to come because they knew they were going to have a great time.......and I hope they did. Thanks guys (you know who you are - please ignore the shady man on the left as he is an APM employee that gets paid to have this much fun).

Which way is the snack bar?

We have just come off a major biological survey in far North West Queensland. Not everyday was hectic but most days were. We were waking up at about 6 am in the morning (yes.....for a lot of people that is a sleep in, but near the border of Queensland and NT it is still nearly pitch black at 7) and on many nights I was still surveying well past 9 pm at night.

That is because we are biologists and we are at the behest of our quarry. To survey birds we have to be up and at it when the birds are up. As they start calling, call loudest and call longer in the pre-dawn light we need to be ready to record before the sun pokes it's head over the horizon. And then there are the nocturnal fauna which, obviously, only come out at night.

As an amusing aside, one of the tasks I had the pleasure of undertaking was call play-back for Masked Owl....alone......in the middle of the bush.....in the dead of night. Creepy? Do yourself a favour and do this!!! Close your eyes or turn out the light or both. Now, imagine how dark it can be in the middle of the bush. Imagine being encapsulated in thin, gnarled and nasty tall shrubland. Think Blair Witch Project or some other scary movie about being lost in the bush or outback and click here.

My point is that we work hard and we get tired. We also get very very hungry. When we are camping remotely we often get a little greedy on the pre-survey shop. Unfortunately I have little self-control, so if there is junk food around I will eat it. A box of Shapes for breakfast? Why not? Six choc-coated sugary, nutty caramel museli bars whilst our spot lighting - sure!

But it gets worse. When we are on an operating mine the food is free and you can literally eat as much as you like. Nobody is checking you and no body cares. I am on Koolan Island with the Animal Plant Mineral team at the moment and the Chef will cook, on request, two beautiful and massive pieces of Red Emperor even though their are two bain maries full of delicious food. Don't even start me on the desert. Talking to a client on site yesterday, he mentioned that people have actually eaten themselves sick and had to be flown from the island. And it is the same at every camp.

Thankfully, on Koolan they have a fantastic gym and it is one of the only mine sites I have been to in 20 years of doing biological surveys that has a full-size kick bag. This is of immense benefit because without it, instead of looking like this:

......I am pretty sure I would look like this:

This little bloke has obviously found the Desert Bar and not yet located the gym as he weighs literally twice that of the average full grown male quoll.

Wildlife Pokies

Every good story needs a catchy title, but I promise the explanation for this title will become apparent. In the mean time, hang up the phone: you do not need to call the RSPCA presently.

There are 2,880 lots of 30 seconds in a 24 hour period. Thankfully, there are only 11 hours and 18 minutes of actual daylight in far northwest Queensland at this time of the year.

During the day, a motion-sensing wildlife surveillance camera can be triggered off by the movement of shadows or foliage or over-energised little brown birds that (I am certain) have Duracell Lithium Batteries shoved up their cloacas. Every time the camera is set off it takes three photos in succession, resetting itself after 30 seconds ready to take another three photos at the slightest hint of next movement. With the exception of the perpetually partying Cane Toads, activity does diminish somewhat at night resulting in a concomitant reduction in photos taken.

Quick maths. 667 lots of 30 seconds of daylight x 3 photos per 30 seconds x 7 cameras x 13 survey nights. Conservatively guestimating that half the cameras were triggered off at half of that frequency on only half of the number of survey nights, that still equates to 50, 000 frames of footage I must analyse for evidence of fauna species of conservation significance within the project area of my most recent biological survey with Animal Plant Mineral.

I will need to wade through copious quantities of Cane Toads, a multitude of Mudlarks, a heap of boring brown Honey Eaters, dozens of Double-barred Finches and a ludicrous amount of Long-tails in the hope of spotting one rare and Vulnerable Gouldian Finch or one Endangered Carpentarian Rock Rat.

But as I begin to wade through the images, something takes me completely by surprise: fauna image analysis is completely addictive. I am like a pensioner on a poky machine. But instead of feeding coins into a slot I am relentlessly pressing the Page Down arrow as my eyesight blurs, my brain bleeds and my metatarsals deteriorate from the repetitive strain of pressing the same button time and time and time again.

As every image passes my eye I long for the next one in the desperate hope that the next one might be 'the one'; clear, indisputable evidence of the existence of the rarest of animals alive and well and caught on camera. And when it does not materialise in a montage of pixels I click again and again and again and again and again.

Though I have not yet captured an image of the target species I so desperately seek, I have captured dozens upon dozens of images of less rare but equally amazing animals. I put this little sequence together of a gorgeous Merten's Water Monitor. The camera also captured some extraordinary shots like this Double-barred Finch in between wing beats as it approaches to land next to a dove. For the non-faunal readers out there I have included prisms of light dancing on the water.

What Have I Got To Lose

Nobody can take my University qualifications away from me. Nobody can delete 'Dr.' from in front of my name. Nobody can un-publish my scientific articles that are published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Nobody at Animal Plant Mineral can demote me or give me 'The Sack' because.......well, because I own the company. In fact, I don't think that even the tax man can take the business away from me because we are model business citizens that pay our taxes on time or early!

So what have I got to lose?

I have featured as a guest on four documentaries that have incorporated tiger snakes into an episode. The Snake Crusader, Animal X, Deadly 60 and Hello Birdy. So you can imagine how enthusiasm was lacking when an American production company contacted me to feature on yet another one.

Whatever enthusiasm I could muster promptly vaporised when I heard those, oh so familiar, words: "We are a low budget production company and we cannot afford to pay you".
That is Production speak for "We have plenty of money for lattes on set every half hour but we are not going to give you any money because we are tight arses and if you don't want to be in our documentary for free we will find someone who does"

Should I have said no? Well, yes and here is a summary of all the reasons why doing low budget wildlife documentaries or working with venomous snakes whilst on camera has caused me no end of grief:

• In 2003 I squirted a host with venom by accident and he made such a song and dance about it on camera that I could barely contain myself. I know documentaries are meant to entertain, but pretending to be in danger from having venom contact your skin is lunacy.
• In 2012 I got tagged on the jeans by an agitated tiger snake whilst I was demonstrating the defensive behaviour of a Tiger Snake. The objective of the exercise was to show how a snake will retreat when threatened or settle completely in the absence of any threatening movement. The demo did not go as it had gone the thousand times prior. It was uploaded to YouTube by Nova 93.7 and a total of 58, 000 have watched it. I copped it from the trolls for weeks, if not months for agitating an already agitated snake. I have done this many, many times, but in this instance it was simply a case of being in an awkward, confined and overstimulating environment and the snake was not able to settle. Click here if you want to be the 58, 001st person to view the footage.
• In 2013 I was shooting another doco on Carnac Island. I was asked two questions. The questions and answers were as follows:
1. How many silver gull chicks would a single tiger snake eat in a week: The answer is around 5, which I know from stomach palpating hundreds of individuals on the island during the silver gull hatching period.
2. How many gull chicks would the entire population consume in a year: The answer is several thousand. We know that the adult population numbers over 400 and they feed for at least six to eight weeks a year.
• Unfortunately the production company stuffed the editing of the answers to the questions making me look like an idiot. On TV this is how it goes: Host "How many chicks would a snake eat in a week" Me the snake expert "Several thousand"
• I could go on......
• .....................but I wont

 When you are in the spotlight you might think you look like this:

In reality it is a lot more like this:

I accept that to be the case and, as such, I agreed to do this documentary. Whatever comes of it, I am glad I did it as I was able to go to, what I think, is one of the most amazing places in Australia. Moreover, the field film and production crew were the most fantastic bunch of blokes. 

This documentary is called Natural Born Monsters, so you can imagine it is not really going to put a cute and cuddly spin on the snakes. Whatever the case, I am certain that I put enough energy, joy and enthusiasm into my role as guest presenter to water down any editorial portrayal of snakes as the spawn of Satan. We shall see.

But what I am more looking forward to is the reaction of the Trolls to this series; not just my episode but all 13 episodes shot all around the world. One of the reasons I most enjoyed making this documentary was that it was never meant to be a purely factual documentary. So, in effect, I was an actor rather than a guest presenter. And, damn it, I had a lot of fun with that.

Natural Born Monsters will be about myth and legend than facts and figures. I wonder if the Trolls will actually realize this? Or will they be so stupid and narrow minded that they will overlook the intent of the series (its genre) and embark on a vitriolic attack on my knowledge and my integrity as a scientist. 

In September 2015 we shall have our answer.