Hawks

There was always an abundance of hawks that we saw on our way to town. No matter the time, but particularly the mornings, we would see them swooping and gliding by. I don’t feel one way or another towards these birds but I have noticed a distinct lack of them these last few months.

A few years ago, the large Government block that owns much of the land, cut its stands of mature pine trees, leaving predominantly bare paddocks with an absence of any other tall trees. The pines were dotted along fence lines or sitting in their own fenced-off areas along the 18km to the main road. I am guessing that the absence of suitable nesting places for these birds has driven them further afield.  They must have had their territories that they surveyed, as each paddock seemed to have a hawk or two flying over it. Now we are lucky to see two or three birds on the whole journey and these are close to privately-owned land, where tall trees still stand, closer to the main highway.

One cannot blame the farmers for wanting to harvest their trees. That was the whole reason they were planted in the first place – to make some money on otherwise, unproductive land. They also provided much-needed shade for the animals, something that will be felt by the cows and sheep I am sure, during the hot days we have been having lately. We have fierce winds on the Peninsula too. The lack of trees means there is no longer any buffer to these winds. We have had a great season as far as rains go this year but in a drier year, without the break to the wind, I am sure the pastures will get even drier.

When I was a child, there was little awareness towards the environment. I remember the neighbouring farmer clearing fifty hectares of native bush so that he could turn that into pasture. My own father used to spray the blackberry on his back paddock with 245T, a chemical later banned, due to its toxicity concerns. One can only imagine the birds that would have been displaced or impacted with those actions.

With urbanisation, and we are seeing it in so many countries in the world, the wildlife is becoming more and more threatened. What is the solution?

I still believe greed is the bottom line - big companies making mega profits with little regard to the environment. It is not so much that something must change, rather, that something will change. The continued destruction will bring about its own consequences. I listened to an interesting chap on U Tube the other day, talking about climate change. He was an expert in his field and stated that even if countries brought in all the changes they are proposing, it would make little difference to the climate. He stated that there would be an awful lot of money spent, an awful lot of inconvenience to a lot of people with no positive outcome – in other words a wasted effort.

My own beliefs are that planting trees back into all the areas that have been deforested throughout the world would help. The other solution is to eliminate greed. For that to happen, a shift in consciousness would need to happen and for that to happen, something massive would have to happen to the world. The way we are going, it probably will.