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Renewable energy vs climate sceptics

Have you ever noticed, after giving your dog a bath, how it will head straight for the nearest patch of renewable energy? Ours has a favourite sunny spot next to the dining room table where he will happily bask, while our solar-powered camping lamp, calculator and torches are recharging on the window sill.

Free sunshine – what’s not to like? As it happens, we have been preparing our little caravan for a weekend music festival in the bush. The 160 watt portable solar panel slides snugly under the bed. At $159, this has proved to be a worthy investment for our outback and bush music weekend adventures. It means you can keep topping up the caravan’s battery (if the sun is shining) and go to bed early if it’s not.

We are not expecting rain. No-one is expecting rain.

Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology has confirmed the winter just past was the hottest since records began in 1910. It was also the 9^th driest winter on record. The average maximum temperature was almost 2 degrees above the long-term average.

Meanwhile, Texas is suffering unprecedented flooding courtesy of Hurricane Harvey, the reporting of which has somewhat overshadowed devastating monsoon flooding in South East Asia. So far, in the latter disaster area, 1,200 people have been killed and almost two million children were unable to get to school.

As we ironically say in the privacy of our own home – “Just as well there’s no such thing as climate change, then!”

Now all, some of, or only a small part of these extreme weather events could be ascribed to global warming/climate change, which, 97% of scientists agree, is mostly caused by human activity.

Despite this consensus on behalf of an apparently overwhelming majority of scientists, sceptics disagree. I happened to read that former Prime Minister Tony Abbott is set to deliver a speech, “Daring to Doubt,” at an annual climate sceptics group meeting in London on October 9.

You might remember Tony Abbott – his reign as PM at one year and 361 days (cumulative terms), was longer than that of Harold Holt and Billy McMahon, but not by much. Abbott the Climate Change Sceptic is infamous in some quarters as the man who canned the government-funded Climate Commission as part of a Budget cost-cutting exercise.

The Climate Commission bounced back as the privately-funded Climate Council. A new report by the Climate Council concludes that the individual States are going their own way, with mixed results.

South Australia is a clear leader in the renewable energy field, the stakes raised by the government’s decision to replace ageing coal-fired power stations with a 150 megawatt solar thermal power plant.

FOMM foreshadowed this in 2014, when the SA government was trying to negotiate the future of the coal mine which fed its Port Augusta power stations. Now, after five years of lobbying and debate, the SA government is aiming to invest $650 million in renewable energy.

It hardly seems worth mentioning that 1,900 kilometres away, the Queensland Government, in a contrarian move, remains committed to the country’s largest Greenfield export coal mine. The Carmichael mine, which includes a dedicated railway line to take coal north to Abbott Point, is deeply unpopular among environmental groups because of the potential damage it could cause to the Great Barrier Reef, both by the number of ships traversing the narrow channels, and through coral bleaching as a result of human-induced temperature increases.

On the other hand, Queenslanders’ love affair with domestic solar panels is demonstrated by the fact that 32% of households are covered in 2017. Lobby group Solar Citizens (almost 100,000 members), welcomed last week’s decision by the Queensland Government to increase the regional feed-in tariff (FiT) program. This will allow solar systems up to 30kW to receive 10.1c per kWh – six times more than what was previously agreed.

Solar Citizens has an ambitious target of one million solar roofs by 2020.

“Queenslanders know a sensible idea when they see it – with 520,000 solar homes, our State has the highest rooftop solar uptake in the country,” a spokeswoman said.

However, critics of domestic solar energy say the flaw is that those who can afford to become self-sufficient do so, and those who cannot end up paying disproportionately more for energy.)

This week, the Climate Council presented its annual ‘state of the States’ renewable energy report. CEO Amanda McKenzie said the State survey showed a major step up from last year. All States and Territories (apart from WA), have strong renewable energy or net zero emissions targets. South Australia is building the world’s largest lithium ion battery storage facility, and over 30 large scale wind and solar projects are under construction across Australia in 2017.

“The good news is that many States are surging ahead and doing the heavy lifting for the (Federal) government.”

Last week, the Victorian government flagged new legislation which would increase its renewable energy target to 40% by 2025. There is also an intermediate plan to lift Victoria’s clean energy target to 25% by 2020.

So yes, it does seem as if individual States (and Councils) are setting their own renewable energy policies, in the absence of clear leadership at a national level.

Noosa Mayor Tony Wellington did not miss an opportunity to talk up his region’s commitment to solar panels. Noosa Shire, which de-merged from the larger Sunshine Coast Regional Council (SCRC), claims 9,000 households in Noosa Shire have solar installations, which is better than the State average. Cr Wellington told the Sunshine Coast Daily Noosa’s goal was to be ‘carbon neutral’ by 2050.

Not to be overshadowed, the SCRC opened a 15 megawatt solar farm in July. The SCRC was the first local government in Australia to offset 100% of its electricity consumption with energy from a renewable source.

But what can humble citizens do, as pro-coal lobbyists clash swords with the solar and wind farm warriors? The go-it-alone mentality arises from a failure on the part of our Federal Government to stimulate investment in the renewable sector. Australia has already promised, under the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 26% to 28% on 2005 levels by 2030. But Tony Abbott’s call as PM to reduce the renewable energy target (and now he advocates scrapping it altogether), was unhelpful.

Whatever way you judge it, a former PM addressing the Global Warming Policy Foundation is not a good look. The last Australian PM to do so was John Howard in 2013 (when he claimed global warming had stalled and was sceptical about the possibilities of an international agreement on climate change).

There have already been reports in the UK media which seized on old quotes by Mr Abbott referring to climate science as ‘bullshit’ and recycling his coal is ‘good for humanity’ comment.

As readers will know, we spent a week out at Carnarvon Gorge in July, a time of year when it is common for the temperature to dip below zero at night. We packed accordingly, then spent four nights kicking off the doona and keeping each other awake as the mercury stayed above 15.

It should be cool at night for the Neurum Creek Folk Festival, but I packed my shortie pyjamas, just in case there is such a thing as climate change.

The autoharp, recorders and other rites of spring

autoharp-spring-recorder — Autoharp player Evan Mathieson at Dorrigo Folk and Bluegrass Festival. Photo: Lindsay Maa http://www.evanmathieson.net

As today is ostensibly the first day of Spring, I am cleaning up the music room, starting with a dusty old autoharp. Honestly, I don’t remember where I got it from, I can’t tune it and don’t know how to play the autoharp in the first place. Yet it sits in the bottom of the cupboard, gathering cobwebs. Occasional bursts of enthusiasm about learning to play the instrument have all faded away. Like morning dew, if you will. When I catch up with Queensland folksinger and autoharp-maker Evan Mathieson (above) I might ask him what he thinks of my old relic.

The autoharp belongs to the zither family and in theory it is a cinch to play. Chords are played by pressing down on a felted bar which mutes all but the strings that make up the chord. You then lightly strum with the other hand. Start with a two or three chord-song like Catch the Wind or Banks of the Ohio.

The autoharp, though descended from a line of German instruments, was popularised in the American folk scene and taken up by some who later became pop stars. In 1965, John Sebastian’s band Lovin’ Spoonful had a hit with his song, Do you Believe in Magic. While Sebastian was highly regarded as an auto harpist and often played it on stage, it is not that discernible in this YouTube clip, although you can at least get a sense of how the instrument is played.

Do You Believe In Magic?

You’ll know the tinkling sound of the autoharp, even if you cannot describe the instrument or imagine how it is played. In 1979, the late Randy Vanwarmer’s lonesome ballad, You Left Me Just When I Needed You Most, was best known for its plaintive autoharp instrumental, played by John Sebastian.

I’m told that Queensland folksinger Evan Mathieson was inspired to start making his own instruments after hearing John Sebastian play a Bach piece on an autoharp. Hand-made instruments can be built to create chords not always available on commercially-made autoharps.

You can get caught up watching old (and new) clips on YouTube of people playing the autoharp. Dolly Parton’s there, so too Sheryl Crow, Maybelle Carter, Billy Connolly, Peggy Seeger and many more.

Crikey, they say even The Dude plays autoharp, though Jeff Bridges apparently prefers playing his Gretsch Country Gentleman guitar when performing with his band, The Abiders.

American virtuoso Bryan Bowers (he’s in the Autoharp Hall of Fame), is credited with introducing the instrument to new generations of musicians. Lakes of Pontchartrain.

I’d love to say someone played autoharp on Song of the old Rake, from Paul Kelly’s Foggy Highway. Programme notes archived by the late lamented Lonely Planet, alas, inform us that Kelly’s band, the Stormwater Boys, used highly-tuned guitars to mimic the autoharp sound. They did it very well.

There are quite a few rock bands and recording artists who use autoharp in their arrangements, but none as effectively as PJ Harvey.

This is an unusual clip in that it starts with PJ alone in a room rehearsing The Words that Maketh Murder, then cuts back and forth between the band version and PJ alone in her room. The lyrics in this anti-war song (from Let England Shake) are brutal, so if you’re the sensitive type, don’t go there.

Evan Mathieson has made a life study of the instrument and also makes autoharps, complete with the signature ‘map of Australia’ sound hole. The instrument suits Evan’s strong baritone and is ideal for a solo act performing folk songs. I’m told he’s leading a shanty session at the Maleny Music Festival on Saturday night.

The music room in our house doubles as the collective home office in which many great decisions are made, petty arguments thrashed out (and where many of the 173 FOMMs were conceived). I believe there will be no argument from She Who is Also Spring Cleaning should I decided to give the autoharp away (SWiASP found a website for the Australian Children’s Music Foundation, which provides free instruments and lessons to disadvantaged children).

Hot cross buns, anyone?

Most homes harbour at least one musical instrument, upon which lessons were learnt and quickly forgotten. Recorders, harmonicas, ukuleles, tin whistles and guitars are the instruments most likely to have been bought on a whim and discarded once lessons got harder.

Most children have a stab at learning an instrument at school – usually a recorder as they are relatively easy to learn and affordable. Any parent who has endured the period where their child struggled to play the recorder without making the infamous ‘squeak’ might want to check out recordings by Maurice Steger. The world champion recorder player has taken on compositions by Vivaldi, Telemann, Handel and baroque music composed for the recorder.

As Steger told ABC Classic FM: “In its heart of hearts the recorder is an incredibly simple instrument and yet it is so hard to make it sound beautiful. That is what makes it so fascinating.”

So before your kids get bored playing ‘Hot Cross Buns’ and decide to pack the recorder away with the jigsaws and board games, get them to check out Steger’s amazing performance of Vivaldi’s Recorder Concerto RV 443.

Recorders are much favoured by schools as they can be bought for less than $10 and immediately give teachers some idea if the pupil has musical aptitude. They are also much-loved by musicians who form early music ensembles (typically using tenor, alto, bass and contrabass recorders). Like the clarinet, the recorder can sound dire in the hands of someone who has no aptitude and/or no inclination to practice.

You may notice how I have digressed from the opening paragraph which claimed I was spring-cleaning the music room. Actually it’s not all that bad – a few years ago I threw out old capos, out of tune harmonicas, a rusty tin whistle, and mailed a parcel of used guitar strings to a charity that sends them to people who can’t afford to replace their guitar strings. There’s still a lot of stuff in the cupboards: boxes of (unsold) CDs, boxes full of demo and rehearsal CDs and cassettes. I always meant to go through the cassettes and convert them to digital files (MP3s). The problem with that is the process happens in real time. So we’re talking not about hours or even days, but more like months of drudgery. So much easier just to take it all to the tip.

I found a commercial cassette – the first Spot the Dog album. After converting it to CD, I asked if anyone wanted the cassette. Not even Mark Cryle (and it was his band’s first recording), took up the offer. He told me he already had a few sitting around at home.

As for the autoharp, after a fitful hour or two grappling with the tuning key and an electronic guitar tuner, I concluded the real issue is it needs new strings. I looked up prices at juststrings.com and figured that at $100+ I’ll just give it a vacuum and put it back in the cupboard.

It’s still not in tune.

Bushfires burning hot and early

bushires-hot-early — Bushfire threatens Coolum, January 2017, photo by Rob MacColl

If you drove to Caloundra today you’d still smell the acrid smoke from last week’s rampant bushfire, which at one stage saw 34 fire appliances and 80+ firefighters on the scene. The smoky odour lingering around Bell’s Creek and Corbould Park Racecourse is a reminder of how quickly a grass fire can get out of control.

Hot westerly winds fanned tinder dry grasslands as the rapidly escalating fire torched trees in seconds. The smoke and flames closed the Bruce Highway, threatened houses in a new residential estate and an industrial park, prompting evacuations.

The blaze was intense – “fireball after fireball about seven storeys high” resident Brendan West told the Sunshine Coast Daily.

The fire was brought under control overnight, but not before Sunshine Coast residents were made aware of how quickly an emergency can arise.

In January, police briefly declared a state of emergency as a bushfire at Yandina threatened Coolum homes, Residents were evacuated as firefighters struggled to contain the fire, which burned for days. Even two months later, Yandina and Coolum residents reported smoke rising from peaty marshlands.

Photographer Rob MacColl sent up a drone to check out the Coolum fire (above and left).

Bushfires are a fact of life in rural Australia. If you’re a landowner, you either join the rural fire brigade or at least work with them to establish fire breaks, carry out controlled burns and establish contingency plans.

Canada, Portugal and Spain also on fire

British Columbia, which is having another bad wildfire season, evacuated almost 40,000 people from the western province in mid-July as 159 fires added to the 188,000 hectares burned out during the fire season. The Canadian government sent in the military and Australia sent 50 fire fighters to lend a hand. Australian fire fighters are prized for their experience and are often exported to fight wildfires in Canada or the US.

No casualties were reported, which is probably more down to good management than luck.

Those who browse the Internet or listen to Radio National will know that southern Europe has also suffered a series of wildfires in (their) summer. Hot, dry conditions and a lack of rain led to disastrous wildfires in Portugal, where 64 people died. There have also been extensive wildfires in Spain and Italy.

As we say in the privacy of our own home, sarcasm dialled up to 99: “Just as well there’s no climate change, then!”

Closer to home, Queensland, supposedly the least-affected Australian State, is starting to chalk up an invidious track record for bushfires. The high fire danger in Queensland is August to October (compared with December to March for the bushfire-prone states of NSW and Victoria).

Weekly bushfire frequencies in Australia increased 40% between 2008 and 2013, according to Be Prepared: Climate Change and the Queensland Bushfire Threat by Professor Lesley Hughes and Dr David Alexander.

The report prepared for the Climate Council says Queensland is experiencing an increase in hot days and therefore an increasing number of days with high fire danger. More than 50% of Queensland’s extreme fire days from 1945 to 2007 have occurred since 1990, most prevalent in the southeast of the state.

Queensland’s tropical and sub-tropical climate protects the State from the high cost of bushfires events in dryer zones, which costs Australia $322 million a year. There is only a 1% chance that a bushfire event will cause an annual residential loss of greater than $14 million. But climate change is significantly increasing the potential for higher costs in the future.

The report says Queensland is experiencing an increase in extreme heat. Seven of the State’s 10 hottest years on record have occurred since 1998.

The Caloundra grass fire came after the hottest August day since 2009. Temperatures reached 31 degrees in Brisbane and at the Sunshine and Gold Coasts – eight degrees above normal. In the western residential suburbs of Logan and Ipswich, the mercury soared to 33 degrees. This record hot August day was followed by strong westerly winds.

Meanwhile, rural fire brigades and landowners are out conducting controlled burns, with the aim of reducing fuel hazards around structures. Controlled burning is not always popular with people living in urban areas as the smoke may linger for days. But the deliberate torching of grass, leaf litter and fallen branches is essential for removing potential fuel that can intensify forest fires.

As is now well-known, Aborigines used fire to carve tracks through dense bush, maintain a pattern of vegetation to encourage new growth and encourage useful food plants. Forest fires can also tease dormant seeds back to life.

Many fires are started by lightning strikes and there’s not a whole lot one can do about those random events. However, most statistics on bushfires/wildfires indicate that half of them are started by human actions, including vehicle accidents, sparks from ride-on mowers hitting rocks, angle grinders and welders, careless disposal of cigarette butts and errant campfires. Sadly, some are deliberately lit by people who get a buzz out of starting fires.

Meanwhile, Australian fire services are preparing for an early start to the bushfire season as Sydney is again shrouded in smoke from hazard burning. Academic researchers writing for The Conversation say new modelling warns that conditions in August 2017 are similar to the 2013 period where unseasonal warmth and low rainfall led to destructive bushfires in Victoria and NSW.

Authors Matthias Boer, Rachael Helen Nolan and Ross Bradstock took a Bureau of Meteorology project that maps water availability levels and combined the data with NASA satellite imagery. This allowed them to develop new tools for mapping and monitoring moisture levels of different fuels in forests and woodlands. They modelled fuel moisture levels during bushfires between 2000 and 2014 and compared those predictions to historical bushfires.

“Our research has identified critical dryness thresholds associated with significant increases in fire area. Rather than a gradual increase in flammability as forests dry out, when dead fuel moisture drops below 15%, subsequent bushfires are larger.”

Bushfires become more intense when dead fuel moisture drops below 10%. The researchers found that moisture content of live and dead fuel is tracking well below 2013 values.

“If warm dry weather continues (we) could reach critical levels before the end of August,” the authors concluded.

“It’s clear that much of the Sydney Basin is dangerously primed for major bushfires, at least until it receives major rainfall.”

Check out your own place now

I’ve been doing an audit of our half-acre bushland allotment, which intersects with other ‘battle-axe blocks’ closer to town than anyone realises. The pest inspector already suggested we collect and burn fallen timber as it encourages termites. It also reduces the amount of potential fuel should a fire start on your land or elsewhere.

So is it safe to make a fire pit and burn excess timber on your own property? It depends on local fire bans, whether your hoses reach that far and, if neighbours take exception.

bushfires-hot-early — Image by R. Simcocks, Eukey.

As preventative measures go, that’s a fair step behind this landowner on the Granite Belt, appropriately kitted out while selectively burning off grass and leaf litter. It does make you think.

Postscript: Rural Fire Services director Rural Fire Services area director Gary Seaman, inspecting the aftermath of the Caloundra blaze, told the SCD it was a “major, major fire”, and abnormally large for winter. I drove down Bell’s Creek Road and took a photo, which shows minimal damage as the fire corridor ran out of fuel close to a new residential suburb.

A backwards step for world peace

backwards-bob-conondale — A backwards step to make a point about world peace

In 2009, Greens candidate Peter Bell walked several kilometres backwards from a Mackay fast food franchise to the office of the National member for Dawson, De-Anne Kelly.

He told ABC radio at the time he did this to highlight the backwards nature of the Howard Coalition’s policies on industrial relations and climate. Despite making headlines with this stunt, Bell polled only 3,489 votes (4.4% of the Dawson ballot). But he made his point, in public.

There was a time when if someone said you’d taken a step backwards, they meant a return to older and less effective ways of doing things. The Cambridge Dictionary’s example: “The breakdown in negotiations will be seen as a step backwards.”

You could argue the ‘step backwards’ is in vogue here and around the world; for example the public re-emergence of white supremacists in the USA. President Trump set the mood for this, with florid statements about expelling Muslims and building a wall to keep Mexicans out.

Now Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un are trading threats about the latter’s reported development of missiles capable of delivering nuclear war heads. One of Trump’s responses, tweeted in the early hours, was to bring down ‘fire and fury’ on North Korea. Does that not seem like a backward step for world peace?

Australia’s non-compulsory, non-binding postal vote about a simple social justice issue is also a step backwards. The Australian government’s stubborn commitment to this $122 million folly could have been avoided if PM Malcolm Turnbull had called a free vote for all federal politicians.

There’s a backwards look too about the kerfuffle over whether you can be a politician in Australia while also a citizen of another country − even when you didn’t know you were a dual citizen. I seem to recall the media making much of Julia Gillard’s Welsh background and Tony Abbot’s British roots. So what? We all came from somewhere else, didn’t we?

“Whatever”, as the Gen Xers used to say, one should never say rash things in print like “if anyone can hum a few bars of Song of Australia I’ll walk backwards to Conondale.” Several readers challenged me about their memories of Song of Australia, the fourth choice when Australia last held a plebiscite in 1977. Regular FOMM reader Elaine Beller wrote to say that in the years leading up to the plebiscite, she was a teenager living in Townsville, and a member of the local youth choral society.

“Just wanted you to know that I really enjoy reading FOMM each week,’ she wrote. “However, I also wanted to let you know that walking backwards to Conondale is on!”

“We had to learn all the patriotic songs for a public performance on The Strand, so the citizens of Townsville could make an educated choice,” she said. “So, I can sing/hum more than a few bars of Song for Australia! The lyrics had us kids in fits of laughter (‘gushing out with purple wine’ being a particular favourite).”

Caroline Carleton wrote the poem (later set to music by Carl Linger) in 1859, her winning entry for a competition held by the Gawler Institute.

I still can’t believe I walked backwards to Conondale on the strength of such purple prose as:

There is a land where honey flows
Where laughing corn luxuriant grows;
Land of the myrtle and the rose.
On hill and plain the clustering vine
Is gushing out with purple wine,
And cups are quaffed to thee and thine – Australia.

So, while I was steeling myself for the backwards trek to Conondale (note how I carefully did not specify from where), I did a little research on the art of backwards perambulation.

Shannon Molloy writing in The Courier-Mail about colourful Qld political characters, found an endearing photo of former Industrial Relations minister Vince Lester walking backwards.

“The intriguing figure of 1980s politics was famed for his hobby of walking backwards, often for hours at a time. He would complete trips in the name of charity, once rear wandering for several hours between two regional towns.”

Colourful Queensland MP Bob Katter once promised to “walk to (or from, according to some reports) Bourke backwards if the gay population of North Queensland is any more than 0.001%”. Despite his half-brother since coming out as gay and Katter being (often) reminded about this loose remark (there was a rainbow protest outside his Mt Isa offices in 2011), he maintains that gay marriage isn’t an issue in his electorate. It appears he never did take up the threat to walk frontwards or backwards to or from Bourke in Western NSW (about 1,600 kilometres to his Mt Isa electoral office).

Sometimes known as ‘retro walking,’ the seemingly unusual habit of walking (or running) backwards is widely recommended for fitness.

You will find many health and fitness links on the Internet which suggest walking backwards strengthens little-used muscles, improves balance and is good for people with knee, hip and back problems.

Some people even do it for a living.

Seaman Nathan Winn is a tour guide for the Pentagon, and routinely walks up to eight kilometres backward per day (including escalators)

Whatever you do, don’t try walking down stairs, steps or steep bush tracks backwards (or backward as they say in the US). As Seaman Mann found, when he tried going down the up-escalator, it’s embarrassing and definitely not funny.

I walk every day but if you want to have some idea how far you’re walking and set some goals to increase the tempo and distance, a pedometer is useful.

It is said that for maximum fitness from walking you need to chalk up 10,000 steps a day. That’s about eight kilometres, the same as that logged by Seaman Winn, but in a forwards direction.

If you fell asleep in your recliner while reading this on your IPad, you may want to do something about your general level of inertia.

Here’s a suggestion: Sign up for Steptember (a fund-raiser for Cerebral Palsy), where you pledge to walk 10,000 steps on each of 28 days during September.

Or you could just donate money and loaf in the recliner and watch old movies on SBS on Demand, Stan or Netflix. I’ve been looking but have not yet found the critically panned 2008 remake of The 39 Steps, a spy thriller starring Rupert Penry-Jones (Silk and Spooks). I’m curious, having seen the 1959 remake starring Kenneth More (which was spiffing). Never did see the original (Hitchcock, 1935).

UK author John Buchan wrote the book at a clifftop nursing home in Broadstairs while recovering from illness. A set of wooden steps which led from the garden to the beach are thought to have inspired the title. In the book these steps become the escape route (frontwards) down to a quay where the villains’ vessel, Ariadne, is waiting to speed them away.

Plebiscites for the huddled masses

plebisicites-same-sex-marriage — Rainbow curtains by Maxbphotography https://flic.kr/p/RJ6yMy

Did you know that the good citizens of Puerto Rico voted in a plebiscite whether to allow the island territory to become the 51^st state of the USA? Despite a low voter turnout (23%), the $15 million non-binding plebiscite achieved a 97% yes vote for statehood. But now the fate of PR lies in the hands of the US government, which has no legal obligation to follow through.

The issue for Puerto Rico’s 3.42 million citizens is the country’s insupportable debt, worsening poverty and rapidly declining population. The Pew Research Centre says the childhood poverty level among Hispanics of Puerto Rican origin is 58%, the figure based on a median household income of $18, 626. Puerto Ricans living on the US mainland, meanwhile, have a household income of $33,000 (if born on the island) or $44,000 if born in the US. The childhood poverty level is 44% and 30% respectively. Little wonder almost half a million Puerto Ricans moved to the US between 2005 and 2015.

As you may have read (unless living under the proverbial rock), the Australian Government wants to hold a national plebiscite on same-sex marriage. Despite the Senate blocking draft legislation this week, the government aims to proceed with a $122 million postal ballot. This is so we can find out for sure if what the polls have been saying since 2011 are right – that more than 50% of the people want marriage equality.

But as per the outcome in Puerto Rico, there’s no guarantee a government will act on the result of a plebiscite, which, unlike a referendum, is not binding.

Australia has only ever held three plebiscites: two on conscription in 1916 and 1917 (the No vote prevailed), and a third in 1977 which offered a selection of mediocre tunes from which to select a national song. You will note here the bastardry of the choices, with Advance Australia Fair (which attracted 43.2% of the votes) distancing Waltzing Matilda (28.3%) and God Save the Queen (18.7%), which the Fraser government decided to keep as the official national anthem). Another 9.8% voted for Song of Australia (Caroline Carleton/Carl Linger). Close to 653,000 people voted for this song, but if you can hum me a few bars I’ll walk backwards to Conondale.

National songs aside (Bob Hawke reinstated Advance Australia Fair as the National Anthem in 1984), plebiscites are only ever held (in Australia) to decide issues which do not require a change to the constitution. Elsewhere in the world, as noted by election analyst Antony Green, the terms plebiscite and referenda are interchangeable. Some countries (New Zealand, even) hold citizen-initiated plebiscites to decide a range of issues, like whether to smack a child or not.

The prominent constitutional lawyer George Williams, explaining why plebiscites are so rare in Australia said: “They go against the grain of a system in which we elect parliamentarians to make decisions on our behalf”.

Professor Williams said referendums necessarily polarise debate, as happened in Ireland when a yes/no proposition was put to the community.

“As a result, even if the referendum did succeed, it may leave bitterness and division in its wake,” he wrote in the Sydney Morning Herald.

National University of Ireland lecturer Brian Tobin said the Irish experience showed that putting a human rights issue to a national vote is a crude means of legalising same-sex marriage. “It forces a historically oppressed minority to literally have to plead with the majority for access to marriage in the months prior to the vote. It also provides a platform for those opposed to misinform the public and air anti-gay views.”

Labor Senator Penny Wong spoke against the plebiscite proposal in Parliament this week, saying it will expose same-sex couples and their children to hatred. It’s a fair argument, given that Australia seems well behind the times when it comes to giving minorities a fair go.

Wake up, Australia!

So far, 23 countries have legalised same-sex marriage since the Netherlands took the first step in 2001. Only Ireland has put the question to a popular vote. As SBS News reporter Ben Winsor noted in June this year, there are now 670 million people living in countries where same-sex marriage is a legal right.

In 2015, the Supreme Court of the United States declared that the constitution protected the rights of citizens to marry, regardless of gender. It was the same year that Ireland voted 62% in support of same-sex marriage.

Nevertheless, Northern Ireland has not passed same-sex marriage legislation. The Church of England remains opposed to it, despite ongoing internal debate, and gay marriage has become a legal minefield in the aforementioned Puerto Rico.

The Australian government could resolve the issue simply and cheaply by holding a free ballot for members of parliament. This would cost the taxpayer precisely nothing and would avoid months of divisive debate.

Facebook’s Rainbow Warriors

Social media was aflame on Wednesday night as people ridiculed the costly notion of a (voluntary) plebiscite. Many people offered findings on what else $122 million could buy (chicken nuggets for all, said one post).

A cursory search by yours truly turned up another fascinating nugget: The cost of the same-sex marriage postal ballot is only $6 million more than the 2017-2018 Budget approved last month by Noosa Shire Council. The Shire covers 868.7 square kilometres and has a population of more than 52,000 residents.

But getting back to Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States located in the northeast Caribbean Sea. Then White House press secretary Sean Spicer said of the June 11 vote, “now that the people have spoken on Puerto Rico, this is something that Congress has to address.” But Spicer is gone and Congress has an easy ‘out’ pointing to the low (23%) voter turnout. The key reason Puerto Rico wants Statehood is to be protected by US bankruptcy laws.

As Carlos Ivan Gorrin Peralta, a professor at the InterAmerican University of Puerto Rico told The Atlantic magazine, “To make a long story short, the prospects (of nationhood) are between zero and negative-10 percent.”

I’m not suggesting that Australians will boycott the (voluntary) postal ballot to that degree. But the Puerto Rican plebiscite shows what can happen when governments try to railroad people into something they do not want.

In 2011, then Opposition Leader Tony Abbott proposed a plebiscite to test Australians’ support for a carbon tax. This was variously described in the media as “junk politics” and “an expensive, bad idea”.

Moreover, Abbott said that if the plebiscite showed support for a carbon tax he would ignore it anyway.

If there’s a clear sign Aussies are fed up with the dicking about* over the same-sex marriage debate, it was reflected in the much-retweeted front page of the NT News.

The Murdoch-owned Northern Territory tabloid set aside its usual croc-shock/blood in the water approach. Instead its masthead was decked out in rainbow colours.

Under an image of two hands intertwined the NT News declared: “The legalisation of same sex-marriage is inevitable. It’s time to end this farce”.

Cool. Now can we have our chicken nuggets?

*dicking about’ – to do absolutely nothing constructive and be completely useless to the point where it can aggravate others. (Urban Dictionary).

The dangers of plastic waste

plastic-recycling-dangers — Photo of plastic recycling plant fire in Birmingham (2013) courtesy of West Midlands Fire Service Photographic 2017

I wish someone had told me about Plastic Free July before August arrived. But hell, it’s never too late to start learning new tricks, eh!

In case you missed it too, this is a global initiative started in Western Australia. From its humble beginnings in 2011 with 40 people in Perth, Plastic Free July has now spread across the country and around the world. In 2016, 100,000+ Western Australians and more than 1 million people worldwide took part.

“Every bit of plastic ever made still exists and in the first 10 years of this century the world economy produced more plastic than the entire 1900’s.”

The initiative aims to educate people to cut down on their consumption of single-use plastic. The main thrust is to get people to stop using disposable shopping bags. Australians already have an incentive, in that there is already a ban in Tasmania, South Australia, the Northern Territory and the ACT.

About a third of the plastic consumed in Australia ends up at recycling plants to be ‘down-cycled’ into other products. Plastic, as we know, lasts forever, unless of course it catches fire, in which case it burns as fiercely as oil or natural gas. Fire is an ever-present risk at waste and recycling plants because of the highly combustible nature of the stored materials.

In mid-July, a major fire broke out amid stockpiles of paper and plastic at the Coolaroo Recycling plant north of Melbourne. The political fall-out from this fire spread further than the smoke plume, sparking a class action threat and a move by the Victorian government to audit all recycling plants in the state.

Victoria (and other States) would probably want to avoid something like the UK’s record of fires at waste and recycling plants (300 per year), including the one depicted (above) at a recycling plant in Birmingham.

Meanwhile back home…

No-one knows for sure how many recycling plants there are in Australia because many are private companies licensed by their respective Councils. However, Deakin University environmental science lecturer Trevor Thornton, writing in The Conversation, quoted 2013 figures from the Department of Environment and Energy which estimate there are 114 waste recycling plants in Australia.

Thornton says the industry needs a national registry, updated annually. Governments need to provide tax breaks so plant operators can upgrade their equipment and also provide manufacturers with an incentive to use recyclable material in their products.

“At the same time, we should consider penalising businesses which use non-recyclable packaging when alternatives exist,” Thornton said. He cited retailers who sell goods in multi-material packaging like polystyrene and plastic without providing an alternative.

I was musing about all of this and more after realising I need to break a habit of asking for bags at the supermarket. I’ve been kidding myself that they are being re-used at home as rubbish bags. Just because a plastic bag gets used twice or even three times doesn’t make it any better for the environment.

Major supermarket chains Coles and Woolworths have already made a commitment to phase out single-use bags within a year. Woolies has revealed it uses three billion bags a year. Coles has not released data but it is probably of a similar scale.

Plasticfreejuly.org says six out of 10 Australians are already refusing single-use bags and using a variety of alternatives, all of which involve bringing your own container when you go shopping. But it’s not just a shopping problem – cling wrap, plastic water bottles, drinking straws, plastic takeaway containers and plastic cutlery are all potential sources of pollution. But as we’ll read later, it’s not as simple as chucking everything into the yellow bin.

The Waste Authority of WA says Australians use one million tonnes of plastic a year (most of it packaging) and 320,000 tonnes of it goes to landfill. But even the refuse, reuse, recycle mantra won’t be enough to hold back the tide of plastic garbage which is engulfing oceans.

Some plastic ends up in waterways and the ocean – where scientists predict there will be more tonnes of plastic than tonnes of fish by 2050.

The Plastic Oceans Foundation says the world is producing nearly 300 million tons every year, half of which is for single use. More than eight million tons is dumped into our oceans.

As for the oceans becoming a massive plastic rubbish dump, how in hell does plastic end up there? Some of it is microbeads from the manufacturing and recycling process which finds its way to the ocean via drains and runoff. Containers carrying plastic product to foreign ports fall off ships. The best-known example is the container full of thousands of yellow toy ducks lost at sea in 1992. You can read more about this phenomenon and how ocean currents play their part by browsing this educational website created by clever people at the University of NSW.

Data from plasticoceans.org underlines the impact of this pollution on the planet (plastic manufacturing uses 6% of the world’s fossil fuels). Every year 500 million bottles and one trillion bags are discarded as waste (not to mention 24.7 billion disposable nappies). On the scale of things, it’s good that a third of this waste is recycled.

While Australia seems on track to phase out single-use bags, we need to do something about our addiction to bottled water. A Choice Magazine story in 2014 highlighted the fiscal folly of choosing bottled water over tap water. If you drink two litres a day from the tap, you’ll pay about $1.50 a year, Choice said. Drink the same amount from single-serve bottles you could be looking at more than $2,800 a year.

The Australasian Bottle Water Institute says ours is a $500 million a year industry selling the equivalent of 600 megalitres (600,000,000 litres) of water a year, 60% of which is sold in single-serve bottles.

If we do use plastic, then we should at least know how to sort the different types of waste for recycling. The ABC’s Amanda Hoh, following up on the ABC’s popular War on Waste TV show, interviewed Brad Gray of Planet Ark for some tips.

Gray says the most common mistake is that people throw soft plastics such as bags, food packaging or “scrunchable” plastic in with containers. These soft plastics get caught in the conveyer belt and the whole recycling system has to be stopped so they can be removed.

“All “scrunchable” plastic including shopping bags, plastic food packaging, fruit netting and dry cleaning bags can be recycled, although most often not via your home recycle bin,” says Gray.

“The best method is to bundle all your plastic bags into one bag and take it to a REDcycle bin located in most metro and large regional supermarkets. These plastics are then recycled into plastic school furniture.”

So now I have finished this week’s FOMM, it’s hi-ho to the supermarket and co-op, sturdy hemp shopping bags in hand. Well, that’s the goal.

Funeral costs a trap for the unprepared

funeral-costs-unprepared — Photo of Shetlands war cemetery by Joanna Penn https://flic.kr/p/ri73H3

If there’s one thing that can put an unexpected dent in the household budget, it’s paying for a funeral. A new study by Finder shows that the average cost of a funeral in Australia ranged from $6,131 (Canberra) to $7,764 in Perth. Of course those who can afford it and deem it necessary pay $20,000 and more for a formal send-off.

Finder’s Money Expert Bessie Hassan says one in five Australians don’t have enough money set aside to cover a $500 setback.

“So if an unexpected death of a family member does arise it could cause significant financial stress.”

Finder analysed Funeral Planner’s survey of some 2,000 adults, which showed that 60% of Australians either haven’t thought about their funeral costs or are expecting relatives to foot the bill. The other 40% have probably gone the whole hog and pre-paid for their funeral, and/or the cost is covered under a life insurance policy.

Invocare, a listed company, owns major funeral businesses in Australia including Simplicity Funerals, Guardian Funerals and White Lady Funerals. Invocare’s 2015 annual report shows it has $422 million in funds under management, derived from pre-paid funeral contracts.

Trends are emerging that show a growing number of Australians are seeking out practical and affordable funeral offerings. Invocare found that more clients were choosing direct ‘committals’ without requiring a traditional funeral service. The other popular choice was to combine a church service with a committal service at a cemetery or crematorium.

There is growing demand too for “Green Funerals” which shun embalming and use biodegradable coffins or shrouds. This seemingly morbid topic reminded me of the darkly comic TV drama, Six Feet Under (2001-2005). SFU explored the dysfunctional lives of a family of undertakers. Every episode would start (spoiler alert) with someone dying (the essential plot element, in that it supplied the necessary corpse). After a season or two, the writers got better at building suspense so the by-now predictable death would still come as a shock, as the person who would soon pop his clogs succumbed to unlikely events including a lightning strike.

I’ve been to a few unconventional funerals/memorial services in recent years. There were a few where the body was cremated in a private family service then the ashes scattered later in a more public forum. A couple of memorial services have been held in locations loved by the dearly departed. So no coffin or wreaths, not even an urn with ashes. People whose loved one had gone to meet their maker spoke passionately and fondly of them. On one or two of these occasions, God never got a mention, nor did Buddha or Allah.

This trend may have something to do with the 30% of Australian who profess to be irreligious. In the 2016 Census (6.93 million people) described themselves as having “no religion”.

My old Scots Dad was fond of saying (apropos of dying) “Och, just roll me up in a carpet and put me oot with the rubbish.” You probably have friends who say similar things, often bracketed with “if I get dementia just put me out of my misery.”

In practice this rarely happens. When the time came (1991), there was a wee church service and a piper played Over the Sea to Skye. Dad’s ashes were inserted into a memorial wall at the local crematorium, next to “Winnie” who died in 1966.

Don’t ask me what it cost because (typical family experience), everyone is so distressed at the passing that they surrender to the blandishments of the dark-suited undertaker.

The plot thickens

The argument against burial is increasingly to do with the finite supply of burial plots. Local governments are understandably reluctant to offer land to be locked up for perpetuity. Burial plot prices have increased dramatically in the past five years, as a result of pre-paid contracts. In Sydney a plot can cost between $4,000 and $52,000.

Nevertheless, She Who Has a Plan wants to be buried and has a burial site in mind. As always, she is more organised than me. I have a will but there is no fine print about what happens to my mortal remains. Whenever cremation is mentioned, I mentally replay that scene in the Coen Brothers cult movie, The Big Lebowski. John Goodman’s character Walter Lobchak, accompanied by The Dude (Jeff Bridges), climbs to a windy clifftop, ready to distribute his friend Donny’s ashes.

(video contains expletives)

More than 50% of Australians who die are cremated, with more people choosing direct cremation. This means you pay only for the body to be disposed of: there is no service and nobody in attendance when the mortal remains are set alight. Later, the family may hold a memorial service, usually in a place that held significance for the departed.

In Australia, a direct cremation starts at $1,500, though most pay around $2,900. That’s considerably cheaper than a burial organised by a funeral director. Just so you know I did some homework on this, it is legal to scatter ashes at sea or on land (with provisos). If you scatter ashes on private land you need the permission of a landowner. Ashes scattered at sea must be dispersed beyond the three-mile (4.82 kms) limit. If you are scattering in a state forest or national park, you need permission.

Some of the information in this essay was gleaned from this website which has a searchable tool on its website where you can shop around for the cheapest funeral option (if that is what you want).

A thorough investigation last year by Choice magazine left few coffin lids closed. This article by Allison Potter is available online

Choice answers the most obvious question; do you have to engage a funeral director? Choice could not find a law that says you have to, although you will find advice to the contrary. Laws differ from one jurisdiction to another, but it’s best to disbelieve those who say it is legal to bury Aunt Bridget near her favourite peach tree. In theory, a DIY back yard planting is possible, but only if the private land is larger than 5ha and the local Council agrees. In any event, burying a body changes the zoning to cemetery. Your neighbours may not be impressed.

This is an ex-parrot

Monty Python’s euphemism-laden sketch aside, Six Feet Under remains the benchmark for kick the bucket humour. From the opening episode to the ‘we’ll all go together when we go’ finale six series’ later, SFU set out to test the boundaries of many taboos. It is full of dark one-liners about the different ways individuals manage grief.

One fine example (from a list compiled by www.pastemagazine.com) comes from episode one. Ruth, matriarch of the Fisher family, flings Christmas dinner to the floor on hearing the news of her husband’s abrupt demise.

She tells her son Nate: “There’s been an accident. The new hearse is totalled. Your father is dead. Your father is dead, and my pot roast is ruined.”

You will note that, despite the show’s title, Ruth does not employ any of Wikipedia’s 128 euphemisms for death (obscure ones include Ride the Pale Horse, Tango Uniform, Hand in One’s Dinner Pail, Wear a Pine Overcoat and Assume Room Temperature).

Carnarvon open for business

carnarvon-business — Carnarvon Gorge – The Ampitheatre by Bob Wilson

It doesn’t seem too widely known that the once-notorious black soil road from the Rolleston turn-off to Carnarvon Gorge is now completely sealed. True, there is an unsealed section between Takarakka Resort and the National Park headquarters, but it’s a few hundred metres at best.

In the 1970s, a hired car full of adventurous Kiwis set off for Carnarvon, 720kms west of Brisbane, having heard it was a must-do wilderness experience in Queensland.

“Mind you, it’s four-wheel drive country only,” we were warned. Even with a four-wheel drive vehicle, after heavy rain, the black soil roads to Carnarvon from Injune or Rolleston could become impassable. You either couldn’t get in or couldn’t get out. We naïve Kiwis of course hired a conventional six-cylinder sedan and went close to running out of fuel as the car made slow and slippery progress. We turned back and kind people we met in the pub at Injune offered space in their homes for our tired bodies.

In 2017, the 40 kms of new sealed road from the Rolleston turn-off to Carnarvon completed in June, makes it a dream run. Even last year, when the road between the turnoff and Takarakka Resort was still unsealed, Carnarvon Gorge attracted 65,000 visitors.

The gorge is a spectacular sight after driving across the seemingly endless central Queensland plains. It’s a scenic drive in from the A7 Carnarvon Highway between Rolleston (100 km to the north) and Injune (150km to the south). The only tip for the novice in 2017 is to make sure you have plenty of fuel and to realise that you might need to forego Facebook for a few days.

There was a long period when the remoteness of Carnarvon Gorge and the spirituality of a place held sacred by local Aborigines was the key attraction for hikers keen to soak up the solitude and silence. Friends who recently stayed at Carnarvon Gorge during school holidays were disenchanted with the numbers of people staying there. They have a four-wheel drive vehicle so also visited Mt Moffat, which they said was less spectacular but comparatively devoid of people.

After spending four nights at the gorge (during school holidays), I’m wondering what sort of growth pressures the park will face in coming years. But I’m thinking that Carnarvon Gorge visitor numbers will stay fairly constant. Unless you like a 10-hour driving day, you’ll have to stay overnight at least once between Brisbane and your destination.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s 2005 management plan for Carnarvon noted there were 27 separate tourism operators allowed to do business within the national park. These include coach and helicopter tour operators but no flying in the park itself – drones, as the sign at the headquarters said, are not allowed either. Accommodation and camping ranges from a camp site at the National Park headquarters (36 sites), which, for some reason, is only available in school holidays. At Takarakka Resort, 4 kms outside the park, one can choose between pitching a tent, hooking a caravan up to power and water or staying in one of the powered safari cottages (canvas roof and walls and timber floors). Alternatively, there’s the Carnarvon Gorge Wilderness Resort just down the road where you can enjoy most of the comforts of home.

Unlike some travel articles, which carry coy disclaimers that (writer) was a guest of (airline-travel agency-resort), this blog pays its own way. She Who Organises Things paid in advance for the four nights (powered caravan site at $46 a night). We also signed up for the Sunday night roast dinner ($25 per person).

If I found anything at all less than satisfactory it was the cleaners with leaf blowers.

That minor irritation was offset by the free outdoor movie night (The Castle), which is cornier than I remember but somehow very dinky-di.

Carnarvon Gorge is rugged and remote, and even with its well-marked tracks and the support of local rangers, it would not be hard to get into a spot of bother. One has to rock-hop over the six creek crossings and there are ladders and vertical steps involved with other walks. We walked about 12 kms on our first day and ran out of water by the end of the trip. So you evidently have to carry at least one and probably two litres per person. A reasonable level of fitness is required.

If you are a serious bush-walker with a four-wheel drive vehicle you could spend some weeks exploring this 164,000ha national park and the unsealed roads into nearby Mt Moffat and Ka Ka Mundi national parks.

Carnarvon Gorge was surrounded by pastoral properties, parts of which have since been incorporated into the national park.

In the mid-1880s, white explorers Thomas Mitchell and Ludwig Leichhardt made the public aware of the area’s permanent water. This led to settlers taking up blocks in Central Queensland and sparked off two decades of open aggression between local indigenous groups and the newcomers.

Libby Smith’s historical account of European settlers living on Carnarvon Station (now owned by Bush Heritage), chronicles the hardships suffered by successive owners of the 59,051ha station north-west of Carnarvon Gorge.

They had to battle droughts, floods, bushfires and invasive pests like prickly pear and feral animals. Above all was the remoteness of the property, which sits between Mt Moffat and Ka Ka Mundi.

Even in 2001, the resident managers described Carnarvon Station as more remote than their last posting in Kakadu. Co-manager Steve Heggie said the biggest challenge was the inability to enter or exit the property after the rains. A trip to town involved four hours of hard driving ‘before you even hit the blacktop’.

“We had to plan for adequate supplies of food, fuel and work stores, medical emergencies and for volunteers stranded after rain.”

Smith writes that Carnarvon National Park was extended in the 1960s and 1970s to include pastoral holdings which had been surrendered. They include Salvatore Rosa National Park (1957) and Ka Ka Mundi (1973). The park was also extended west in the 1980s and 1990s. Smith notes there was initially fierce opposition to proposals to expand national parks into pastoral leases.

“There was a fear of any change in land use and ‘locking up country.’”

Smith’s story deals only with pastoral history, but considering that Aboriginal history in Carnarvon long preceded European settlement, the reaction by pastoralists to the conservation ‘threat’ is quite ironic.

In 2001, Bush Heritage purchased Carnarvon Station for conservation. It has since been found to contain 25 regional ecosystems, including seven that were endangered.

Feedback from last week

The Prickly Pear column, also inspired by this trip, engendered a lot of feedback. One reader wrote to say her grand-father had to walk off the land near Roma as a result of prickly pear infestation and became a land valuer instead. Some readers were keen to say the pear has been maligned and that many people grew up used to eating the fruit, which is tasty and nutritious. Another emailed to correct us, saying the river at Nindigully is the Moonie, not the Balonne.

Perplexed Pensioner of Reeseville once again took issue with my claim that white settlers introduced cats. A topic for another Friday, perhaps.

Ah well, Queensland still won!

Prickly Pear makes a comeback

prickly-pear-comeback — Photo of Prickly Pear near Roma by Bob Wilson

You don’t have to travel far inland in Queensland to see that Prickly Pear, the invasive scourge of farmland in the early 1900s, is making a comeback. ‘The Pear’ as it is sometimes known by farmers, has started to re-appear, growing and spreading after the floods of 2011 and 2012.

The Opuntia species (a member of the Cactaceae family) was introduced to Australia (by white settlers) in the late 1880s to form hedges and provide fodder for times of drought.

Prickly Pear, a cactus plant from the Americas, thrived in the Australian outback. The combination of cacti and rabbits, another introduced species, took a heavy toll on Australian farmland at the turn of the century. By the 1920s, Prickly Pear was a major problem. After some years of experimentation, authorities introduced a biological control in the form of the Latin American Cactoblastis Moth. The moth lays eggs on the prickly pear and its larvae eat the cactus. This was hailed as one of the world’s most successful examples of biological control (the moth eggs were distributed manually). Within six years all varieties of the prickly pear cactus had disappeared.

Not so circa 2017, with varieties of Prickly Pear re-emerging along roadsides and in paddocks around western Queensland and the southern Downs. When we travel I notice things like this and habitually make notes (usually when I’m a passenger).

In some areas (Goondwindi to Inglewood is particularly bad); the cactus has spread into farmland back from the road. Some plants look unwell, though whether through poisoning or biological controls we don’t know.

At this point it should be noted that the variety known as Tree Pear (photos) has some resistance to Cactoblastis, though it can succumb to a cochineal insect. The Southern Downs Regional Council recommends the application of herbicides.

In the interests of moistening a dry subject, let me digress and mention two folk bands that enshrined the Prickly Pear legend into folklore.

Toowoomba musicians John and Sandy Whybird formed Cactoblastis Bush Band when John, then a high school teacher at Chinchilla, saw what Prickly Pear could do to the land. He taught students about the pest and the late 1920s solution to the invasive species.

The band, which recently recorded a CD, performed at the Chinchilla Museum last September to commemorate the 90^th anniversary of the introduction of Cactoblastis to the area.

A Brisbane folk duo (Jan Davis and the late Tony Miles), adopted the clever stage name Prickly Pair. They played together for eight years in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

My research led me to the Urban Dictionary, which defines Prickly Pair as slang for the stubble growing back on a man’s testicles after shaving (for an operation or whatever).

Anyway, the Common Pest Pear is back and local farmers ought to know that notification of infestation is required under the Biosecurity Act 2014. No-one expects a problem of the scale which caused farmers to walk off their land after ‘The Pear’ and rabbits finished off what floods and drought had missed. There’s a plaque alongside the Moonie River at Nindigully that commemorates the success of the Cactoblastis moth, when the use of poisons and cochineal insects proved to be ineffective.

Early settlers, in their wisdom, decided to set up a cochineal industry to provide dye for clothing. The cochineal is a scale insect from which the natural dye is extracted. The insects are found on the pads of prickly pear cacti then brushed off and dried.

The Pear is commonly spread by birds and animals eating the fruit and excreting seeds. However, the new spread of Prickly Pear has been accelerated by floods moving broken cacti pads from one location to another.

The State Government’s Business Queensland website describes the Pear as “vigorous in hot, dry conditions, causing other plants to lose vigour or die. It competes and invades pastures and impedes stock movement and mustering.”

Authorities took the rampaging cacti seriously and began investigating biological control agents in 1912. More than 150 insect species were studied, with 18 insects and one mite released in Queensland.

Today, eight insects, including Cactoblastis cactorum remain established in Queensland. An article by Leonie Seabrook and Clive McAlpine in the Queensland Historical Atlas describes Prickly Pear in Queensland as a generic term for five different Opuntia cacti. Three are low-growing shrubs up to 1.5 metres high and two are tree pears, growing up to three metres. The article observes that at the height of the infestation in 1925, prickly pear had spread across 24 million hectares in Queensland and New South Wales.

While the (imported) Cactoblastis Moth was hailed as a biological saviour, early settlers must shoulder the blame for importing invasive species and pests into Australia. Apart from prickly pear and many other weed species, settlers also introduced cane toads, rabbits and feral goats, pigs, cats, brumbies, foxes and camels.

Prickly Pear observations aside, we had four lovely days hiking in Carnarvon Gorge where the weather was balmy. It did rain on the last day but I went for a walk anyway. It’s only rain, as they say in NZ.

As you’ll have gathered, we just spent 10 days towing our little caravan out to Carnarvon Gorge via Rolleston and back via Injune, Roma, St George, Nindigully, Goondiwindi and Warwick. Today we headed home, via Toowoomba and Esk.

Other on-road observations included a lot of road kill, a feral cat, a lone kangaroo out in the middle of the day, a couple of pelicans in a dam, two emus foraging in the long grass, an abandoned car that had been pillaged for parts and a bloke on a recumbent bicycle (the rider lying down and pedalling in a reclining position). We saw two vans smaller than our 12-footer and a massive RV being towed by a 4×4 (with a small car being towed behind that).

We had the usual (and unusual) mishaps common to most caravan expeditions. Like trying to move the car when it was still shackled to the caravan by metal chains (good one, Bob). I bought one of those stainless steel coffee percolators you brew on the stove. First cup I poured tasted a little soapy. As I sipped further down the cup it transpired someone had left a spoonful of congealed dishwashing liquid in the bottom of the cup. (Guess who usually does the dishes? Ed.)

A highlight of the trip was the free camp at Nindigully, where about 50 caravanners were camped beside the Moonie River. A goodly number of them gathered in the pub to watch the State of Origin decider. Many people left at half-time (we assume they were NSW supporters or maybe they were just cold). The ones who remained were in good spirits, taking their crushing defeat like good sports. As we headed back to the van in the dark we heard a chorus of cheering and the war cry ‘Queenslander!’ from the pub.

“How do you reckon NSW will go next year?” I asked She Who Spilt A Pot of Pepper In the Van But Didn’t Want It Mentioned.

“I reckon they’re cactus,” she said, chortling quietly under her maroon beanie.

Online subscribers might have noticed we did not file a FOMM last week. That’s because we were out bush and offline. I did post a 2014 column to email subscribers. You can read it here:

https://accounts.google.com/o/oauth2/approval/v2?auto=false&response=code%3D4%2F95ecdlLPrRNanWf2kHbdOTsrt5gIfRbSQ-pTeN6r60s&approvalCode=4%2F95ecdlLPrRNanWf2kHbdOTsrt5gIfRbSQ-pTeN6r60s

Irish songwriter Kieran Halpin plays Maleny August 6

kieran-halpin-house-concert — Irish songwriter Kieran Halpin

Irish songwriter Kieran Halpin may not know all the answers, but he knows how to construct memorable songs. Some of his best-known songs (like All the Answers and Nothing to Show for it All), have been covered by major UK folk artists.

Kieran’s house concert in Maleny on Sunday August 6 is a long-awaited encore to his 2011 concert at Bob & Laurel Wilson’s home. Kieran is on a 24-date tour of Australia and New Zealand.

Kieran is a prolific songwriter with a base in Germany, from where he keeps up a touring schedule of more than 160 gigs a year. Only the best songwriters have their songs covered by major artists and Kieran Halpin’s name keeps cropping up on albums by the likes of Ilse De Lange, Vin Garbutt, Dolores Keane, The Battlefield Band, John Wright and Niamh Parsons.

You may have heard people sing his tunes at folk clubs, pubs and festivals. Songs like All the Answers, Angel in Paradise, Nothing to Show for it All and Mirror Town are among those covered multiple times. Some of Kieran’s songs have been translated into German, Finnish and Spanish. He has recorded 22 albums in his native Ireland, Scotland, London, Nashville, Oxford and Sydney and his latest, Doll, was recorded in Germany.

On stage Kieran Halpin is powerful and passionate, intimate and intense. As one critic said, he has a ‘‘wonderful stage presence and surprising humour.”

“Every song has a story and every lyric paints that story clearly”

The concert on August 6 starts with a short set of original songs from house band The Goodwills, often heard on Australia all Over.

Tickets are $15. Bookings are essential as seating is limited. Email Laurel goodwills (at) ozemail.com.au.