Australian_Geographic_-_December_2015_AU_

YOU R AG

126 Australian Geographic

Flight of fancy

by Nathan Barden

I stumbled across nest-
ing ospreys last winter
in a Brisbane suburb.
Being a photographer
and keen ornitholo-
gist I later returned
to investigate, and
photographed one
of them returning
to the nest with
a fi sh for lunch.

YOU R

PHOTOS

In our Lat/Long on St Arnaud (AG

127), we said the 1611 King James

Bible was the first to have num-

bered verses and be mass-pro-

duced. The Geneva Bible (pub-

lished 1560) was in fact the first,

and a 1608 edition is on display at

St Arnaud’s Bible museum.

POSTSCRIPT

Defenders of national parks fought for
many years to stop cattle grazing in
these areas. A horse trek might have
some claim to a macho historical
charm, but it is hardly supporting the
natural state of the environment. I
cannot take a dog on a leash for a
picnic, but a business can spend days
damaging tracks and reintroducing
feral weeds with many horses? There
always needs to be a balance between
protection and access. I don’t believe
there is a simple answer, or that one
aspect naturally has priority, so we
must keep discussing this dichotomy
from time to time.
JEREMY WOOD, BONYTHON, ACT

SING-SING

I was going through old colour slides

recently and found this one (below)

of a sing-sing in Inauaia, in the Mekeo

district of Papua New Guinea, in 1957,

and it reminded me of your feature

Cultural conservation (AG 120). I was

posted in the district as an agricultural

officer with my family, and lived in the

community. This was my second job in

PNG, having worked a few years on a

rubber and cacao plantation in the

northern district. I don’t know why

this sing-sing was held, but it’s clearly

an important event because six chiefs

were there, watching on in regal outfits.

HENK MULDER, STANTHORPE, QLD

ESTUARY LIFE

I wanted to share these impressions

from the boardwalk at Narooma, NSW.

A toadfish flutters round the whelks

Hoping to find one on its back;

A heron peers and pecks, and daintily extracts

A baby soldier crab,

Carefully tossing to ensure the legs go rightways

down.

A four-leaf mangrove sprouts

Where none had grown before.

Somewhere up there the mountaintops are

crumbling –

Down here a slow accretion nurtures small

delights

And quiet satisfaction.

LEITH DOUGLAS, DUFFY, ACT

History revisited.

Reader Henk Mulder took

this in central PNG in 1957.