Carranya

In a first for Australia, the ACT Minister for Human Rights has introduced a bill to amend the territory’s Human Rights Act 2004 to include the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment. Great news for the folks at ACT, and I reckon their native flora and fauna will be celebrating as well. What does this actually mean? The UN Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment has defined it as including the following: clean air a safe climate access to safe drinking water and…

Avid birdwatcher and amateur fossil hunter, Melissa Lawery, recently hit the jackpot by finding the earliest recorded Aussie fossil bird tracks on a beach along the south coast. There turned out to be 27 tracks from different species, all had three widely-spaced toes ending in sharp claws, and some had a distinctive claw for perching. Dating back some 120-128 million years ago, these have been verified as the oldest bird tracks in the Southern Hemisphere. To put this in perspective, at this…