From platypuses and possums, through wombats, echidnas, devils, and kangaroos, to quolls, dibblers, dunnarts, and kowaris, Jack Ashby knows them all; and in his recently published “Platypus Matters; The Extraordinary Story of Australian Mammals,” he guides his readers on a tour of their lives, their evolutionary stories, and the challenges they face in the modern world.
Australia’s “black summer” of 2020 – the most devastating wildfire season in the modern recorded history of that continent – was not only responsible for a level of devastation that stunned all who either witnessed it in person or saw the heart-breaking photos of it, it is also thought by many involved in studying global climate change to be a precursor of wildland fire seasons to come.
Not so very long ago, while listening to a fascinating podcast discussion about Neanderthals between Melvyn Bragg, Simon Conway Morris, Chris Stringer, and Danielle Schreve from the BBC’s In Our Time program’s archive, I was struck by the use of the phrase “the domestication of fire” by one of the panelists (my apologies for not recalling which one). I hadn’t previously thought about fire as something to be domesticated, but immediately upon hearing the phrase, I thought “well there it is.”
When it comes to the history of ecological f… well, “fornication”-ups, few can rival that of the 1935 importation of 101 individual Central and South American Cane Toads (Rhinella marina) into Australia. The idea seemed reasonable enough at the time and was done with the best of intentions – bring in the toads to control the insects that ate the sugar-cane being grown there. However, like many species introductions done with the best of intentions, this one truly paved the proverbial road to you know where.