Silent Hearts - a pathway to extinction for antbed parrots

"To survive today, other animals must endure global warming, pollution, and fewer habitats.
More tragically, they must endure the silence of human hearts".
Anthony Douglas Williams

Australia is well known for their history of flora and fauna extinctions, and it seems to be a national trajectory from the lowest level of government to the highest; we keep "developing" land at unsustainable rates and all the "little" developments accumumulate into a mega sized snowball.  We have so many "recovery plans" for the habitats we remodel, to the point that most of them can never be fully funded to fruition.  The environment, though everyone talks about it, is lowest on the funding ladder and there simply is not enough tax payer funds to support every plant and creature that is in need.  At some point in the very near future the average Aussie is going to have to realise that the government just can't fix each and every habitat that we destroy in our development frenzy, it is in fact going to be up to the every day Aussie to say enough is enough, and put their own hand up and say "it is up to me".
It's just this sort of attitude that created a plan to save one of Australia's most threatened parrot; the antbed parrot aka the golden shouldered parrot; also known to the Olkola people as the alwal. 
Since the 1920's the golden shouldered parrots have disappeared from more than half their range in Cape York Penninsula.  Situated within their northern homelands is Artemis Cattle Station, considered by many a scientist, parrot lover and bird watcher to be the last stronghold of this parrot, but even here their numbers have declined from around 500 to now less than 50.  The owners of Artemis Cattle Station, Tom and Sue Shephard, have spent decades trying to ensure that this particular parrot survives, but in recent years have become so concerned over the ever decreasing population, that have stretched out their hands (and their hearts) to a group of scientists and supporters who are willing to get things doing and moving into the direction of actual ground work recovery. This collaboration has become the Artemis Nature Fund.
Today's podcast opens the doors (and hopefully listeners hearts) to the life of a golden shouldered parrot and the birth of the Artemis Nature Fund.
This is a 2 part "special" that is our gift to the dedicated listeners as our Season 4 finale.
This has been an extraordinarily long Season 4 - our demonstration of solidarity with our fellow Australians, and people throught this world, in various lockdowns through Covid19.  BirdCast went past the usual season ends to provide lockdown listeners, as was the request, with something bird related to listen to.  But as the lockdowns have lifted we are going to take a break and hunt down some great stories for season 5.
So unlike previous episodes Part 2 of Silent Hearts - a pathway to extinction for antbed parrots will be next week! Be sure to listen in.

https://artemis.org.au/