Angry Hobart aldermen have branded Targa Tasmania as ‘organised hooning’ and its competitors ‘environmental bandits’.
Eva Ruzicka and Bill Harvey came out firing in their decision not to approve a proposed Targa stage on the Domain in April.
‘It’s organised hooning, and we’ve a problem with hooning on our streets,’ Mr Harvey said. ‘Targa actively encourages that behaviour.’”
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A fire that has blackened 17,000ha on the West Coast was started from a car accident on the Western Explorer Highway, a controversial road damned for its scarring of the Tarkine, home to Australia’s largest temperate rainforest.
Tasmanian Greens leader Peg Putt said conservation groups had warned that the road would prove a source of destructive activity and an ignition point.
‘The Greens are now warning that no further roading into remote Tarkine wilderness should be allowed, although the Government is actively pushing such an agenda via Forestry Tasmania,’ Ms Putt said.
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Hydro Tasmania says it cannot guarantee water supplies to the $2 billion Gunns Limited pulp mill.
The news comes as water flows in the South Esk basin plummet because of drought.
As well, Hydro Tasmania has reduced generation and thus water releases from Great Lake.
The level of the lake has dropped to 15.9 per cent of capacity ahead of a weekend of high evaporation because of hot weather.
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A cheeky portrait of the Danish royal family has won this year’s Bald Archy Prize.
Newcastle railway worker James Brennan was awarded the $5,000 prize in Canberra this morning.
‘I was vacuuming and it just popped into my head out of nowhere,’ Brennan said.”
The Bald Archy Prize was created in 2004 as a spoof of Australia’s most prestigious art award, the Archibald.
It is also the only art competition in the world allegedly judged by a cockatoo, named Maude.
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The Tasmanian Government will introduce legislation to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions by 60 percent by the year 2050.
Premier Paul Lennon says the target will be based in 1990 levels.
He says the government’s car fleet will be carbon neutral by mid 2010 and State Cabinet will consider making it mandatory for major government buildings to have solar power and hot water installed.
Mr Lennon has also announced an agreement with Greening Australia to offset the government’s air travel.
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Alex Wade of Surf Nation reports:
Alex ‘Alfy’ Cater won the Oakley Surfing Life Biggest Wave Award. He took home $20,000 and a Sea-Doo personal watercraft.
Marti Paradisis bagged the ‘best overall performance’ award — this shot of him at Shipstern Bluff on the Tasman Peninsula shows why.
(Via Surf Nation)
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Found on Flickr. Taken by Hobart photographer Andrew Skeggs who says “I am happy to live in a world where people do this kind of thing.”
And regular contributor Peter Daalder managed to get a photograph before the flags disappeared.
The background:
An enterprising Northern Midlands farmer has built a giant grass castle out of hay bales.
Philip Osborne builds a hay bale structure each year at fairfield near Epping forest on the Midlands Highway.
Last year Mr Osborne, in his fifties, made a straw version of the ancient Stonehenge, called Hayhenge which proved popular with passing motorists.The farmer uses a loader to put each 300kg bale in place based on a sketch made by his wife Louise.
‘I do it for my own amusement,’ Mr Osborne said.
‘Farmers are miserable sods but we do have a lighter side.’
(Via The Mercury)
Here’s his version of Stonehenge which kept Midlands Highway motorists amused last year.
Photograph: Maria Fletcher
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AFP photograph
Climate change may threaten the survival of king penguins — one of the most iconic creatures of the Antarctic, researchers warn.
A long-term study of the penguins, known for their distinctive yellow feather ‘ear muffs’, reveals just a slight ocean warming had a significant effect on their breeding success.
International researchers behind the project say that under current predictions for global warming, the penguins face the risk of being wiped out.
King penguins — the second largest penguin after the emperor penguin — live in the sub-Antarctic islands, including Macquarie Island, south-east of Tasmania. There are about 2 million breeding pairs worldwide.
Their diet consists mainly of small fish and squid, and because of their one-year breeding cycle they are considered sensitive to any seasonal change in food supply.
Over nine years, researchers studied the birds on an island in the Crozet Archipelago in the southern Indian Ocean, marking 456 penguins with electronic tags.
They found that high sea-surface temperatures reduced the amount of marine prey available to the king penguins, forcing them to travel further in search of food.
According to their calculations, a sea-surface warming of 0.26 degrees would lead to a 9% decline in the adult penguin population.
Current models by the UN’s panel of climate scientists predict an average increase of 0.2 degrees a decade for the next two decades.
(Via The Age)
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The body of a minke whale and its calf are dragged onto the whaling ship
The Australian Federal Government says photographs taken by the Customs ship the Oceanic Viking of Japanese whalers killing a whale and its calf will strengthen any legal case against the whalers.
The pictures, released by the Government today, show a slaughtered minke whale and its calf being hauled up the ramp of the Japanese ship, the Yushin Maru.
Customs has also released video of whales being harpooned from the ship.
The Government is extending the duration of its whaling surveillance program and says the Attorney-General is still considering what kind of legal action should be taken and who it should be brought against.
Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett says the pictures released today support Australia’s position.
‘I think it’s explicitly clear from these images that this is indiscriminate killing of whales, where you have a whale and its calf killed in this way,’ he said.
‘To claim that this is in anyway scientific is to continue the charade that surrounded this issue from day one.’
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A handful of Tasmanian surfers are giving the big-name pro surfers something to think about with their ongoing assaults on Shipstern Bluff.
Photos and footage from their amazing efforts are some of the most compelling in the Oakley Surfing Life Big Wave Awards — Australasia’s most sought-after big surf challenge.
‘They’re just charging,’ says photographer Stuart Gibson, winner of the prestigious Nestle Award, who’s been busy documenting his mates’ efforts at Shipstern.
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