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- 6 Links & Downloads
Fencing Links & Downloads
Links to more articles on Ozcranes and other sites, relevant to crane-friendly fencing issues – entrapment on fences; barriers to movement; and rank vegetation growth.
Feedback
Comments and suggestions on Crane-friendly Fencing are welcome, contact details are here».
Ozcranes downloads
- Fencing Research: ‘Barbed Wire Fencing as a Hazard for Wildlife’ (pdf 191KB). Courtesy scientist Rodney van der Ree, with records of 62 species caught including a Sarus Crane. From the Victorian Naturalist 116(6) 1999, pp. 210-217.
- Fencing Research: ‘Bird casualties in fences in Diamantina National Park, Queensland, 1996-2008’ (pdf 29.6KB). A Ley & R Tynan, courtesy WFF, with records of 18 species. From Australian Field Ornithology Vol 26, 2008, pp. 96-98.
- Magazine articles: Wingspan Dec. 2007 (small version, pdf 1.13MB). Articles on Birds & Barbs, and Brolgas in SE and northern Australia. (Wingspan was the quarterly magazine of Birds Australia, now BirdLife Australia)
Brolgas take flight (Courtesy Mitch Reardon & Jan O'Sullivan)
Ozcranes pages
Barriers to movement
Size matters! Cranes are large birds and need room to move around their wetlands. Ozcranes pages with FAQ and images of Brolgas and Sarus Cranes, and their lifestyles –
- Australian Cranes» Ozcranes Australian Cranes Intro, leads to FAQ for Brolgas and Sarus
- Cranes in Flight» Images of crane flight, landing and takeoff.
Vegetation Management
Fencing to exclude stock can lead to dense overgrown vegetation, this also excludes cranes. Some related Ozcranes pages –.
- Dancing Brolgas» – Matt Herring worked with Riverina farmers (SE Australia) to support Brolga nesting, by integrating wetland management into farm routines. Including crash grazing and fire to manage overgrown vegetation.
- Burning for Brolgas» – Experiments with fire and cyclical grazing in a Conservation Park (north Queensland), celebrated for Brolga habitat until overgrown by tropical pasture grasses.
- Goodbye Sarus: How could we lose the Tableland cranes?» – grazed wetlands and edges of water storages are a key habitat for the only known large winter aggregation of Australian Sarus Cranes. Fencing round wetlands and storages could close major roost sites.
- Explore all Ozcranes pages with the Site Map»
Other sites
Wildlife Friendly Fencing Australia has on-line resources with images, case studies, Guidelines and Action Plan.
South Africa
Blue Cranes in South Africa have been killed or injured on barbed wire, and locked out of their breeding sites by new fencing (ICF)
The Blue Crane is the national bird of South Africa, classified Vulnerable in the IUCN Red List. The main threats are listed as poisoning or other persecution, and powerline collisions, but fencing issues also play a role. South African farmers need to fence crops like lucerne due to grazing and trampling by native mammals. The Blue Crane is naturally a grassland bird and ranges across croplands. The Endangered Wildlife Trust African Crane Conservation Program report fence collisions as a regular source of injury or death for South African cranes, adults are caught in flight and chicks when climbing through fences before fledging. Some newsletters and conference proceedings can be downloaded from their site and from the ICF Library. The Group also produce brochures for landowners. The Overberg Blue Crane Group have programs and resources including fencing guides to protect Blue Cranes, and are partners with BirdLife South Africa's Fence Mitigation project, with online forms to report full details of birds caught in fences.
‘Grus Grapevine’ newsletter for March 2006 gave details of a Blue Crane chick that starved to death when the parents' territory (including farm dam) was fenced in during the breeding season (pasture and cropland were being converted to vineyards near a major road, which also limited access). The dam was scraped out and cleaned ready for the wet season, so the Blue Crane pair lost both accessible food and water before the chick was able to fly.
Landcare Groups & Landowners
Some Australian Landcare groups and owners in regions with key crane habitat are implementing wildlife-friendly fencing in their projects –
- TREAT – Trees for the Evelyn and Atherton Tableland
- Barron Catchment Care – Barron River Catchment Management Association
- Johnstone River Catchment Management Association. No website, contact via the north Queensland Wet Tropics regional NRM body Terrain NRM.
- Brolga Recovery Group, SW Victoria (offline, August 2020)
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