Frank Nicklason
It is a fact that hundreds of wallabies died as a result of this particular poisoning episode and that the bodies were found (and filmed) by a local farmer in the running stream, which is a domestic water source.
PIERS Akerman’s opinion piece: “ABC’s very smelly carcass” (The Mercury 9/10) has the the potential (perhaps the intention) to cause confusion.
Some errors need correction.
Last week’s Four Corners program interviewed an activist who admitted to keeping a possum, killed on the road, in a freezer for later presentation “to make it sort of real to the public”. This action was exposed by Four Corners, and certainly not condoned.
The refrigerated possum in the Four Corners program had no connection at all with the community group Doctors for Forests, for whom I am a spokesman.
In my role as spokesman I contributed an interview to the Tasmanian ABC news story on 26/4/06 mentioned later in the article by Mr Akerman.
In this story I warned about the negative public health consequences of the decaying carcasses of 1080 stricken animals in steams used for domestic water.
Some time prior to this interview I had given a copy of the independent documentary Two Visions by David Warth to the ABC (and to a number of other media outlets).Two Visions features footage of rotting 1080 poisoned wallabies in a stream in the upper catchment of the North Esk River. The film also features a deer lying dead on the bank of the stream, again poisoned by 1080.
The wallaby footage was mentioned in Mr Akerman’s piece and was, I understand, used by the ABC for their April news story.
Timber Communitities Australia’s Barry Chipman does have a legitimate complaint against the ABC as the footage was not labelled.
The wallaby and the deer were poisoned by 1080 and died in or near Savoury Creek (I’m not joking!) which is a tributary of the Ford River, known to locals as “the rivulet”.
It is a fact that hundreds of wallabies died as a result of this particular poisoning episode and that the bodies were found (and filmed) by a local farmer in the running stream, which is a domestic water source.
It is a moot point whether 1080 poisoned animals typically seek water or whether it is the shelter provided by streamside vegetation they are attacted to. A 1080 poisoned animal can travel hundreds of metres before dying.
There is no doubt that large numbers of 1080 killed animals have been found in streams all over Tasmania.
A copy of the Two Visions DVD will be sent to Mr Akerman for his interest and comment.
Dr Frank Nicklason
(Spokesman,Doctors for Forests)
West Hobart
PS Two Visions will be having it’s commercial launch on 28/10 at the State Cinema.
