The Wimmera has been invaded.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The invaders have come from the north and taken up residence.
They show no signs of leaving, and continue to multiply year after year, now being in plague proportions.
Local governments can't deal with the problem.
The departments who claim to be their guardians throw their hands up in the air and say it's somebody else's problem.
Yes the invaders are corellas, now in their thousands in every town, and multiple thousands along the rivers and countryside.
The birds are intelligent, cunning, noisy and very destructive.
Community groups have to protect their assets to try to minimise the damage being caused.
At the same time, there seems to be an expectation that local government can find a solution to the problem, even though corellas are not their responsibility.
This is simply a big cost shift.
Apart from footing the bill, local government doesn't get a say in determining what measures may or may not be legal to handle the problem.
The red tape to follow, to be able to even make a small dent in corella numbers, is time-consuming, costly, often unpopular and usually achieves nothing.
Scare guns frighten more dogs than corellas.
Small numbers culled makes little difference to their excessive numbers.
Other tactics used to move the birds on result in them camping in another location, usually nearby, and in human terms you could say they laugh about it all.
Local government needs help.
It really needs the relevant state government departments to take the matter seriously.
They can't say they don't have enough people to do something.
The public service is growing in numbers at a rapid rate.
There must be people who can do something useful, instead of sitting in offices dreaming up ways of telling us how to live and what to think.
Take the bird off the protected list, reinstate the trapping programs.
Do something.
Due to their excessive numbers they are now creating problems for other species, taking over the nesting sites of other native parrots and the habitats of sugar gliders.
How long will it be before somebody acknowledges the damage they are causing and does something about it?