Interesting Bits and Pieces
From recent happenings or stories around Australia and the world.
Australia's Bluey joins the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York for the first time.
The parade featured 16 giant balloons, 28 floats, 40 novelty and heritage inflatables, 12 marching bands, 10 performance groups, 700 clowns and one Santa Claus.
More.
A great wild brumby solution on Mornington Island.
Wild horses have roamed the remote, Indigenous community of Mornington Island in the Gulf for more than 15 years. A trail of ruined earth and damaged vegetation shows the long-term impact of the 40-odd brumbies that live on the island. Mornington Shire Mayor Kyle Yanne said the horses damaged parks and ovals. "You can't grow a garden," he said, "They destroy our beautification works."
But culling the horses was not an option. So community leaders had to get creative. A small team were tasked with rounding up the brumbies and placing them into three newly-built paddocks on the edge of town. Council workers have been collecting the wild horses over the past week and holding them in the local oval before walking or mustering them out to the paddocks.
The animals will now be used as part of a horsemanship program that trains young people and sends them into careers around the country. Some of the horses will also be sold to neighbouring stations on the mainland.
Gilbert's potoroo, the world's rarest marsupial, is released back into its original habitat at Two Peoples Bay in WA.
Only about 100 individuals of the Gilbert's potoroo species are left on earth.
The wild population was wiped out by a bushfire that tore through 90% of the habitat in 2015 prompting a major effort to save the species from extinction. Six potoroos were recently released back into the area at Two Peoples Bay on the slopes of Mount Gardner and will be closely monitored.
I'd never heard of this ...
Hundreds of Australians sailed to South America to build a jungle utopia in the 19th century but it didn't go to plan.
500 Australians did in the 1890s, led by a radical socialist, but the venture didn't quite go to plan. William Lane was the radical socialist who took on the plight of striking shearers. His promise of a New Australia commune, one that offered a fair deal for all, was enticing for a group of mostly unionists, disgruntled shearers and socialist Christians who sold everything to fund the arduous adventure.
The Royal Tar was built with the collective funds of the New Australian followers for the voyage.
It turns out that combining Australian shearers with the South American jungle, jaguars, parasitic insects and strict rules about no booze and sex with local girls was not the secret to a utopian new life.
After almost three years, New Australia comprised just a few small villages and farms but many settlers had left to seek a better life in larger cities. Many of the other Australians returned home and settled in Mildura, Victoria, and the South Australian Riverland. In response to falling numbers and failing finances, and appalled by the behaviour of the young shearers, Mr Lane abandoned the community.
Thinking of frogs today ...
Scientists hope a collation of Aussie frog noises will leapfrog Taylor Swift on the charts. The Songs of Disappearance is an album entirely of frog calls collected by researchers and citizen scientists. This year's album contains thousands of submissions from throughout the country and will be released on December 2.
Last Christmas, an album of bird calls from the Bowerbird Collective made history by entering the ARIA album charts' top five, surpassing Mariah Carey and ABBA.
Queensland driver reviver shutdown triggers calls for more roadside trivia signs.
The Queensland government plans to shut down all 23 of its driver reviver sites across the state next year because they no longer met health and safety regulations.
The Chase trivia expert Brydon Coverdale says fatigue zone roadside trivia should be ramped up and travellers have backed the call and urged the government to supercharge the program.
The signs are found along select highways across the state, and have a basic but effective premise. There's a trivia question on a sign, and to find out the answer drivers have to keep their eyes peeled for the next sign several kilometres down the track.
Outback golden bandicoots 'rapidly' reproducing in western NSW, after formerly being locally extinct.
The first golden bandicoots have been born in NSW's far north-west in 100 years, after formerly being extinct in the region.
As part of the Wild Deserts project, run by the state government and the University of New South Wales, in late May, 27 of the native marsupials were translocated from Western Australia and released in Sturt National Park in the far north-west corner of New South Wales near Tibooburra.
Wild Deserts project coordinator Reece Pedler said there had been "incredibly rapid reproduction" since the animals had been released.
The Queensland Indigenous Women Ranger Network, which manages and protests the Great Barrier Reef, has won 1 million pounds or AU$1.8 million in the Prince of Wales's Earthshot Prize.
The Prince and Princess of Wales hosted the 2022 ceremony for William's Earthshot Prize in Boston as the finale of their 3 day US tour.
Living on Saint Helena since 1882, Jonathan has scooped awards from the Guinness World Records for being the oldest known living land animal and the oldest chelonian – an order comprising tortoises, turtles and terrapins – ever recorded.
While Jonathan has long been covered in wrinkles, he is now also blind with cataracts and lacks a sense of smell. Although his precise date of birth remains unknown, estimates suggest he hatched around 1832. Pictured below in about 1886.
The three-day party bringing together residents from across the island will start at the governor’s house on Friday, with highlights including a tortoise-friendly “birthday cake” and an animated video about his life
He will even enjoy nibbles and a chat with the governor and his wife, Emma, while those who attend the celebrations will receive a special certificate, be able to buy Jonathan-related stamps, and see the winners of an art competition launched to celebrate the famous reptile.
An Australian invention we might often take for granted when we put the bins out.
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Idwall Richards is credited with inventing the automated modern front-side-lift garbage truck.
Now 92, Mr Richards was inspired by the advent of wheelie bins in the early 1980s.
Idwall Richards and his Tweed-based waste management company Solo Resource Recovery, also known as JJ Richards and Sons, had long been working on automation and the invention capitalised on his company's early decision to pursue side-loading rather than rear-loading mechanisms.
The original side-loading rubbish truck designed and built by JJ Richards and Sons at Chinderah in northern New South Wales. Photo: Solo Resource Recovery.
Around the same time, garbage men in Sydney were striking over pay and working conditions. They were upset their working day would be pushed out to five hours, even though they were being paid for eight. "In the heat of the day it gets to you, it's too strenuous. We are men, we are not machines."
Those garbage men ought to have been careful about what they wished for as the invention of Idwall Richards made their job redundant.
His company, Solo Resource Recovery, has now built more than 1,000 front-side lift garbage trucks on-site at its headquarters in Chinderah on the banks of the Tweed River, sending them all over Australia and overseas.
Brett Robinson and Sinead Diver break Australian marathon records, including Rob de Castella's 36yo mark.
Robinson finally eclipsed the mark set by distance running legend Rob de Castella, which had stood since five years before he was born.
After Robinson made his breakthrough at the Fukuoka International Marathon in Japan, Diver broke the Australian women's record at Spain's Valencia Marathon. The 45-year-old bettered Benita Willis's 2006 record of 2 hours, 22 minutes and 36 seconds by more than a minute, crossing the line in 2:21:34.
An ancient and rare rainforest tree that survives in semi-arid outback Queensland is blooming with flowers.
The ooline, Cadellia pentastylis, dates back to the last ice age, more than 10,000 years ago, but these days it stands protected in Tregole National Park near Morven, 650 kilometres west of Brisbane.
University of Queensland researcher Jen Silcock said the ooline had no other species in its genus. "It's a very unique tree, not closely related to anything," Dr Silcock said, "The closest relatives in that plant family — there's only four in Australia — are all along the eastern coast in the rainforest."
Full ABC story.