Transcription Audio

Hello and welcome. Today we’re making something that feels huge—protecting Australia’s native wildlife—practical, doable, and high impact in your everyday life. Here’s the big idea straight from conservation pros: order matters. The people getting the best results don’t start with donations or the occasional tree-planting. They start by removing daily harms, then add high-impact habitat, and only then volunteer. That sequence multiplies impact. Why? Because the baseline pressure on our ecosystems is already high. Australia’s climate has warmed by about one and a half degrees since 1910. The Black Summer fires burned around 24 million hectares; estimates suggest almost three billion animals were affected. And while those moments are dramatic, the quiet, everyday pressures compound—uncontained cats, wildlife-unsafe fruit netting, rodent poisons, night driving through wildlife corridors, and tidy-but-empty gardens. These small hits stack across every street, every night, making everything more fragile when the next heatwave or fire comes. So, if you care—and I know you do—the most effective thing to do first is strip away routine harms at home. Then build habitat where you live. Then volunteer and advocate. That’s the insider move. Let’s start with the number one everyday change: cat containment. The data is blunt. Across Australia, cats kill hundreds of millions of birds and reptiles every year. Even an “only sometimes out” cat adds up across a suburb. One cat might take a handful of animals; a hundred cats means thousands of local birds, skinks, and small mammals gone. The fix is simple and good for cats, too: shift to indoor-only living or build a catio. A curfew helps; 24/7 containment is better. Make it stick with enrichment—vertical shelves, puzzle feeders, window perches, and rotating toys so novelty keeps their brain buzzing. Set up a bird-watching station inside overlooking a native garden. Many cats become calmer and more affectionate when they’re not in that hunt–stress cycle. Check your local council—many are moving toward containment rules or incentives. If your cat killed zero animals this year, how many lives would that save on your street? Next: build habitat where you live, work, and even where you park. Habitat isn’t a single plant; it’s architecture. Pros go for structural complexity—layers of groundcovers, mid-storey shrubs, and canopy, with water and refuge spots woven in. That structure feeds insects, which feed small birds, which feed larger species. It’s the base of the pyramid. A few specifics. Plant local provenance natives—species grown from local genetic stock—so the insects that evolved with them can actually use them. Mix nectar timings so there’s something for honeyeaters throughout the year, and include night-flowering plants to support moths and, indirectly, microbats. Add water, safely: shallow dishes with sticks or rocks for easy escape, refreshed daily in hot weather, placed near cover but with a clear line of sight so animals can scan for predators. Thinking of a nest box? Great—if it’s designed well. Use insulated boxes with the right entrance size for your target species and mount them away from harsh afternoon sun—usually an east or south-east aspect in Australia. Poorly designed boxes can overheat; good ones can double local breeding success. If you grow fruit, switch to wildlife-safe netting. In New South Wales and Victoria, backyard fruit tree netting must have a mesh of five millimetres or less when stretched. Look for products labelled wildlife-safe and install them taut. Loose netting is a silent killer of birds, flying-foxes, and gliders. Fencing matters, too. A smooth top wire and a raised bottom wire reduce injuries for kangaroos and wallabies trying to jump or crawl through. Avoid loose netting on fences—gliders, birds, and bats don’t see it until it’s too late. Here’s the bigger picture: backyard biodiversity has become frontline conservation. With clearing still happening in some regions, urban and peri-urban gardens now form crucial corridors. Your patch connects to the next patch, and on it goes. Your garden is not just your garden; it’s one tile in a nationwide mosaic that either helps wildlife move and feed—or doesn’t. Now, rodents. This is where good intentions often backfire. Many common rodent baits are second-generation anticoagulants—brodifacoum, bromadiolone. They linger in poisoned rats and mice, so when owls, quolls, goannas, or even pets eat them, the poison moves up the food chain and can be lethal. It’s widely documented across Australia. Here’s how to control rodents without collateral damage. Start with prevention: seal entry points with metal mesh; store pet food and chicken feed in rodent-proof containers; elevate compost; tidy fallen fruit; reduce clutter they use for shelter. Then use traps, not poison, wherever possible. Enclosed snap traps or quality electric traps in tamper-resistant boxes are humane and targeted. If you must use a bait, pick first-generation anticoagulants like coumatetralyl or warfarin—still with care—and always in lockable bait stations where wildlife cannot access them. Avoid second-generation products entirely. Check traps daily, dispose of carcasses securely—double bag and bin so scavengers don’t get a dose—and consider a professional who practises integrated pest management rather than just dropping baits and leaving. Two quick wins most people overlook. First, night driving. Dusk to dawn is peak movement for many animals. If you commute through wildlife areas, slow down, scan the road edges, and use high beams when safe. That simple change saves lives. Second, make windows visible to birds. If you’ve had a small bird hit a pane, you know how awful it is. Add external decals, vertical strings, or fine netting over problem windows. Place feeders and birdbaths either within two metres of glass or well beyond ten—close enough that birds can’t build speed, or far enough to be out of the collision zone. Now, let’s zoom out to strategy. Pros build every action around bottlenecks. They ask: what’s the single biggest constraint on this species here? If pardalotes can’t find nesting sites, a forest of saplings won’t fix it—nest boxes might. If honeyeaters starve in late autumn, you need plants that flower then, not just spring colour. If cats are wiping out skinks, keep the cat in, and suddenly every other effort starts to work. Bring that mindset home with a simple three-step plan. Step one: remove daily harms. This week, make a call on the cat—curfew tonight, design the catio this month. Swap wildlife-unsafe fruit netting for five-millimetre mesh. Walk your fence and fix hazards—loose wires, netting, barbs. Audit rodent control and switch to wildlife-safe methods. Add a shallow water dish with a stick in a shaded spot. Slow down on the evening drive. Make windows visible. Step two: add high-impact habitat. Over the next month, plan for structure: groundcovers, mid-storey, canopy. Use your council’s local species list. Aim for season-long nectar and some night-flowering plants. If you add a nest box, choose one designed for your target species and mount it out of the afternoon sun. Plant for insects first; everything else follows. Step three: then volunteer and advocate. Once your own baseline damage is low and your garden is pulling its weight, join a Landcare or Bushcare group, or support a wildlife rescue service. When you show up, ask the bottleneck questions: which species are we helping, and what’s their limiting factor here? Are we fixing that, or are we decorating? That one shift turns good intentions into measurable recovery. A couple of local nuances. Many councils are introducing cat containment initiatives—check yours and get ahead of it. On fruit netting, remember the five-millimetre standard in NSW and Victoria, and even if you’re elsewhere, that’s still the right choice. With nest boxes, quality and placement are everything—insulation, entrance size, and aspect. And in heatwaves, water stations can be literal lifelines; a refreshed bowl can mean survival for birds, lizards, even pollinating insects. If all of this feels like a lot, pick one action today. Bring the cat in tonight. Swap the bait for a trap. Add a shallow water dish and refresh it. Order wildlife-safe netting. Plant three local natives this weekend—one groundcover, one shrub, one small tree. Share what you’re doing with a neighbour so the impact spreads across the street. Here’s the last thought. Everyday actions matter not just for the numbers, though they are huge, but for the compounding effect. When you remove a constant source of harm, everything else you do starts working better. Birds breed more successfully, reptiles hold their ground, pollinators rebound, and suddenly your street is quieter at night not because life is gone, but because it’s settled, fed, and safe. Reduce the baseline pressure first, then amplify recovery. That’s how professionals do it. And that’s how we—households and neighbours—can turn care into real outcomes for the wildlife that makes Australia, Australia. Thanks for listening, and thanks for being part of the solution today.