1.
Wilsons Promontory
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The Wilsons Promontory is a peninsula that forms the southernmost part of the Australian mainland and is located in the state of Victoria. South Point at 39°08′06″S 146°22′32″E is the southernmost tip of Wilsons Promontory, located at nearby South East Point, is the Wilsons Promontory Lighthouse. Most of the peninsula is protected by the Wilsons Promontory National Park, evidence of Aboriginal occupation at Wilsons Promontory dates back at least 6,500 years and the park is highly significant to the Gunai/Kurnai and the Boonerwrung Clans. The first European to see the promontory was George Bass in January 1798 and he initially referred to it as Furneauxs Land in his diary, believing it to be what Captain Furneaux had previously seen. But on returning to Port Jackson and consulting Matthew Flinders he was convinced that the location was so different it could not be that land, Bass and Flinders recommended the name Wilsons Promontory to Governor Hunter, honouring Flinderss friend from London Thomas Wilson. Little is known of Wilson except that he was a merchant engaged in trade with Australia, the promontory has been a national park, to one degree or another, since 1898. Wilsons Promontory National Park, also known locally as the Prom, the site was closed to the public during World War II, as it was used as a commando training ground. The only settlement within Wilsons Promontory is Tidal River which lies 30 kilometres south of the boundary and is the focus for tourism. This park is managed by Parks Victoria, in 2005 a burn started by staff got out of control and burnt 13% of the park, causing the evacuation of campers. In 2009, a strike near Sealers Cove started a fire that burned over 25,000 hectares. Much of the area had not been burned since 1951, although the fire burned to within 1 kilometre, the Tidal River camping area and park headquarters were unaffected. The park reopened to the one month after the incident. Despite the damage, the beauty of the area remained largely intact. In March 2011 a significant rainfall event led to flooding of the Tidal River camping area. In September 2011 public access to Tidal River was reopened following repair of the access road. All sections of the south of Tidal River were closed while further repairs of tracks. The park was fully re-opened by Easter of 2012, tourists may choose basic or glam, cabins or camping if they wish to stay inside Wilsons Promontory National Park. Many however choose to stay in accommodation just outside the Park in Yanakie, there are overnight hiking tracks with two key circuits, one in the north and one in the south
2.
Victoria (Australia)
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Victoria is a state in southeast Australia. Victoria is Australias most densely populated state and its second-most populous state overall, most of its population is concentrated in the area surrounding Port Phillip Bay, which includes the metropolitan area of its state capital and largest city, Melbourne, Australias second-largest city. Prior to British European settlement, the area now constituting Victoria was inhabited by a number of Aboriginal peoples. With Great Britain having claimed the entire Australian continent east of the 135th meridian east in 1788, Victoria was included in the wider colony of New South Wales. The first settlement in the area occurred in 1803 at Sullivan Bay, and much of what is now Victoria was included in the Port Phillip District in 1836, Victoria was officially created as a separate colony in 1851, and achieved self-government in 1855. Politically, Victoria has 37 seats in the Australian House of Representatives and 12 seats in the Australian Senate, at state level, the Parliament of Victoria consists of the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council. Victoria is currently governed by the Labor Party, with Daniel Andrews the current Premier, the personal representative of the Queen of Australia in the state is the Governor of Victoria, currently Linda Dessau. Local government is concentrated in 79 municipal districts, including 33 cities, although a number of unincorporated areas still exist, Victorias total gross state product is ranked second in Australia, although Victoria is ranked fourth in terms of GSP per capita because of its limited mining activity. Culturally, Melbourne is home to a number of museums, art galleries and theatres and is described as the sporting capital of Australia. The Melbourne Cricket Ground is the largest stadium in Australia, and the host of the 1956 Summer Olympics, Victoria has eight public universities, with the oldest, the University of Melbourne, having been founded in 1853. Victoria, like Queensland, was named after Queen Victoria, who had been on the British throne for 14 years when the colony was established in 1851. The first British settlement in the later known as Victoria was established in October 1803 under Lieutenant-Governor David Collins at Sullivan Bay on Port Phillip. In the year 1826 Colonel Stewart, Captain S. Wright, fly and the brigs Dragon and Amity, took a number of convicts and a small force composed of detachments of the 3rd and 93rd regiments. Victorias next settlement was at Portland, on the south west coast of what is now Victoria, edward Henty settled Portland Bay in 1834. Melbourne was founded in 1835 by John Batman, who set up a base in Indented Head, from settlement the region around Melbourne was known as the Port Phillip District, a separately administered part of New South Wales. Shortly after the now known as Geelong was surveyed by Assistant Surveyor W. H. Smythe. And in 1838 Geelong was officially declared a town, despite earlier white settlements dating back to 1826, days later, still in 1851 gold was discovered near Ballarat, and subsequently at Bendigo. Later discoveries occurred at sites across Victoria
3.
International Union for Conservation of Nature
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The International Union for Conservation of Nature is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. It is involved in gathering and analysis, research, field projects, advocacy, lobbying. IUCNs mission is to influence, encourage and assist societies throughout the world to conserve nature and to ensure that any use of resources is equitable. Over the past decades, IUCN has widened its focus beyond conservation ecology and now incorporates issues related to equality, poverty alleviation. Unlike other international NGOs, IUCN does not itself aim to mobilize the public in support of nature conservation and it tries to influence the actions of governments, business and other stakeholders by providing information and advice, and through lobbying and partnerships. The organization is best known to the public for compiling and publishing the IUCN Red List. IUCN has a membership of over 1200 governmental and non-governmental organizations, some 11,000 scientists and experts participate in the work of IUCN commissions on a voluntary basis. It employs approximately 1000 full-time staff in more than 60 countries and its headquarters are in Gland, Switzerland. IUCN has observer and consultative status at the United Nations, and plays a role in the implementation of several conventions on nature conservation. It was involved in establishing the World Wide Fund for Nature, in the past, IUCN has been criticized for placing the interests of nature over those of indigenous peoples. In recent years, its relations with the business sector have caused controversy. It was previously called the International Union for Protection of Nature, establishment In 1947, the Swiss League for the Protection of Nature organised an international conference on the protection of nature in Brunnen. It is considered to be the first government-organized non-governmental organization, the initiative to set up the new organisation came from UNESCO and especially from its first Director General, the British biologist Julian Huxley. At the time of its founding IUPN was the international organisation focusing on the entire spectrum of nature conservation Early years. Its secretariat was located in Brussels and its first work program focused on saving species and habitats, increasing and applying knowledge, advancing education, promoting international agreements and promoting conservation. Providing a solid base for conservation action was the heart of all activities. IUPN and UNESCO were closely associated and they jointly organized the 1949 Conference on Protection of Nature. In preparation for this conference a list of endangered species was drawn up for the first time
4.
National park
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A national park is a park in use for conservation purposes. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns, although individual nations designate their own national parks differently, there is a common idea, the conservation of wild nature for posterity and as a symbol of national pride. An international organization, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, although Yellowstone was not officially termed a national park in its establishing law, it was always termed such in practice and is widely held to be the first and oldest national park in the world. The first area to use national park in its legislation was the USs Mackinac Island. Australias Royal National Park, established in 1879, was the third official national park. In 1895 ownership of Mackinac Island was transferred to the State of Michigan as a state park, as a result, Australias Royal National Park is by some considerations the second oldest national park now in existence. The largest national park in the meeting the IUCN definition is the Northeast Greenland National Park. According to the IUCN,6,555 national parks worldwide met its criteria in 2006, IUCN is still discussing the parameters of defining a national park. National parks are almost always open to visitors, in 1971, these criteria were further expanded upon leading to more clear and defined benchmarks to evaluate a national park. In 1810, the English poet William Wordsworth described the Lake District as a sort of property, in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive. It was known as Hot Springs Reservation, but no authority was established. Federal control of the area was not clearly established until 1877, John Muir is today referred to as the Father of the National Parks due to his work in Yosemite. He published two articles in The Century Magazine, which formed the base for the subsequent legislation. President Abraham Lincoln signed an Act of Congress on July 1,1864, ceding the Yosemite Valley, according to this bill, private ownership of the land in this area was no longer possible. The state of California was designated to manage the park for use, resort. Leases were permitted for up to ten years and the proceeds were to be used for conservation, a public discussion followed this first legislation of its kind and there was a heated debate over whether the government had the right to create parks. The perceived mismanagement of Yosemite by the Californian state was the reason why Yellowstone at its establishment six years later was put under national control, in 1872, Yellowstone National Park was established as the United States first national park, being also the worlds first national park. In some European countries, however, national protection and nature reserves already existed, such as Drachenfels, Yellowstone was part of a federally governed territory
5.
Gippsland
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Gippsland is an economic rural region of Victoria, Australia, located in the south-eastern part of that state. Gippsland is generally broken down into the East Gippsland, South Gippsland, West Gippsland, the area was originally inhabited by Indigenous Australians of the Gunai nation and part of West Gippsland by the Bunurong nation. Before permanent European settlement, the area was visited by sealers and wattle bark gatherers and his business partner Robert Massie joined him in 1837. Both had worked for the Van Diemens Land Company at Circular Head, samuels brothers Hugh and Thomas arrived at Bass shortly after, where they established a successful farming venture. Further European settlement followed two separate expeditions to the area, angus McMillan led the first European expedition between 1839 and 1840, naming the area Caledonia Australis. Following these expeditions, the area was officially named Gippsland, a chosen by Strzelecki in honour of the New South Wales Governor, George Gipps. The township of Bass was surveyed and settled in the early 1860s, Gippsland is traditionally subdivided into four or five main sub–regions or districts, West Gippsland South Gippsland the Latrobe Valley East Gippsland. Sometimes a fifth region, Central Gippsland, is added to refer to the zone between the Gippsland Lakes and Yarram. The climate of Gippsland is temperate and generally humid, except in the region around Sale. In the Strzelecki Ranges annual rainfall can be as high as 1,500 millimetres, in lower levels east of the Snowy River, mean annual rainfall is typically about 900–950 millimetres and less variable than in the coastal districts of New South Wales. Mean maximum temperatures in lower areas range from 24 °C in January to 15 °C in July, in the highlands of the Baw Baw Plateau and the remote Errinundra Plateau, temperatures range from a maximum of 18 °C to a minimum of 8 °C. However, in winter, mean minima in these areas can be as low as −4 °C, the soils in Gippsland are generally very infertile, being profoundly deficient in nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and calcium. Apart from frequently flooded areas, they are classed as Spodosols, Psamments, consequently, heavy fertilisation is required for agriculture or pastoral development. Despite this, parts of Gippsland have become highly productive dairying and vegetable-growing regions, a few alluvial soils have much better native fertility, and these have always been intensively cultivated. In the extreme northeast is a section of the Monaro Tableland used for grazing beef cattle. Gippsland possesses very few deposits of metallic minerals, however, the deep underground gold mines operated at Walhalla for a fifty-year period between 1863-1913. Like the rest of Australia, the seas around Gippsland are of low productivity as there is no upwelling due to the warm currents in the Tasman Sea. Nonetheless, towns such as Marlo and Mallacoota depended for a time on the fishing of abalone, whose shells could fetch very high prices because of their use for pearls
6.
Australia
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Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands. It is the worlds sixth-largest country by total area, the neighbouring countries are Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and East Timor to the north, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu to the north-east, and New Zealand to the south-east. Australias capital is Canberra, and its largest urban area is Sydney, for about 50,000 years before the first British settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who spoke languages classifiable into roughly 250 groups. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the 1850s most of the continent had been explored, on 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy comprising six states. The population of 24 million is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard, Australia has the worlds 13th-largest economy and ninth-highest per capita income. With the second-highest human development index globally, the country highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom. The name Australia is derived from the Latin Terra Australis a name used for putative lands in the southern hemisphere since ancient times, the Dutch adjectival form Australische was used in a Dutch book in Batavia in 1638, to refer to the newly discovered lands to the south. On 12 December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted, in 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially as Australia. The first official published use of the term Australia came with the 1830 publication of The Australia Directory and these first inhabitants may have been ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, were originally horticulturists, the northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by fishermen from Maritime Southeast Asia. The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, the Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent New Holland during the 17th century, but made no attempt at settlement. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688, in 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain. The first settlement led to the foundation of Sydney, and the exploration, a British settlement was established in Van Diemens Land, now known as Tasmania, in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. The United Kingdom formally claimed the part of Western Australia in 1828. Separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales, South Australia in 1836, Victoria in 1851, the Northern Territory was founded in 1911 when it was excised from South Australia
7.
Melbourne
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Melbourne is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in Australia and Oceania. The name Melbourne refers to an urban agglomeration spanning 9,900 km2, the metropolis is located on the large natural bay of Port Phillip and expands into the hinterlands towards the Dandenong and Macedon mountain ranges, Mornington Peninsula and Yarra Valley. It has a population of 4,641,636 as of 2016, and its inhabitants are called Melburnians. Founded by free settlers from the British Crown colony of Van Diemens Land on 30 August 1835, in what was then the colony of New South Wales, it was incorporated as a Crown settlement in 1837. It was named Melbourne by the Governor of New South Wales, Sir Richard Bourke, in honour of the British Prime Minister of the day, William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne. It was officially declared a city by Queen Victoria, to whom Lord Melbourne was close, in 1847, during the Victorian gold rush of the 1850s, it was transformed into one of the worlds largest and wealthiest cities. After the federation of Australia in 1901, it served as the interim seat of government until 1927. It is a financial centre in the Asia-Pacific region. It is recognised as a UNESCO City of Literature and a centre for street art, music. It was the host city of the 1956 Summer Olympics and the 2006 Commonwealth Games, the main passenger airport serving the metropolis and the state is Melbourne Airport, the second busiest in Australia. The Port of Melbourne is Australias busiest seaport for containerised and general cargo, Melbourne has an extensive transport network. The main metropolitan train terminus is Flinders Street Station, and the regional train. Melbourne is also home to Australias most extensive network and has the worlds largest urban tram network. Before the arrival of settlers, humans had occupied the area for an estimated 31,000 to 40,000 years. At the time of European settlement, it was inhabited by under 2000 hunter-gatherers from three indigenous tribes, the Wurundjeri, Boonwurrung and Wathaurong. The area was an important meeting place for the clans of the Kulin nation alliance and it would be 30 years before another settlement was attempted. Batman selected a site on the bank of the Yarra River. Batman then returned to Launceston in Tasmania, in early August 1835 a different group of settlers, including John Pascoe Fawkner, left Launceston on the ship Enterprize
8.
Rainforest
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The monsoon trough, alternatively known as the intertropical convergence zone, plays a significant role in creating the climatic conditions necessary for the Earths tropical rainforests. Around 40% to 75% of all species are indigenous to the rainforests. It has been estimated there may be many millions of species of plants, insects. Tropical rainforests have been called the jewels of the Earth and the worlds largest pharmacy, the undergrowth in some areas of a rainforest can be restricted by poor penetration of sunlight to ground level. If the leaf canopy is destroyed or thinned, the ground beneath is soon colonized by a dense, tangled growth of vines, shrubs and small trees, the term jungle is also sometimes applied to tropical rainforests generally. Tropical rainforests are characterized by a warm and wet climate with no dry season. Mean monthly temperatures exceed 18 °C during all months of the year, average annual rainfall is no less than 168 cm and can exceed 1,000 cm although it typically lies between 175 cm and 200 cm. Many of the tropical forests are associated with the location of the monsoon trough. The broader category of tropical moist forests are located in the zone between the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn. Tropical forests have been called the Earths lungs, although it is now known that rainforests contribute little net oxygen addition to the atmosphere through photosynthesis, Tropical forests cover a large part of the globe, but temperate rainforests only occur in few regions around the world. Temperate rainforests are rainforests in temperate regions and they occur in North America, in Europe, in East Asia, in South America and also in Australia and New Zealand. A tropical rainforest typically has a number of layers, each with different plants, examples include the emergent, canopy, understorey and forest floor layers. They need to be able to withstand the hot temperatures and strong winds that occur above the canopy in some areas, eagles, butterflies, bats and certain monkeys inhabit this layer. The canopy layer contains the majority of the largest trees, typically 30 metres to 45 metres tall, the densest areas of biodiversity are found in the forest canopy, a more or less continuous cover of foliage formed by adjacent treetops. The canopy, by some estimates, is home to 50 percent of all plant species, epiphytic plants attach to trunks and branches, and obtain water and minerals from rain and debris that collects on the supporting plants. The fauna is similar to found in the emergent layer. A quarter of all species are believed to exist in the rainforest canopy. Scientists have long suspected the richness of the canopy as a habitat, true exploration of this habitat only began in the 1980s, when scientists developed methods to reach the canopy, such as firing ropes into the trees using crossbows
9.
Indigenous Australians
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Indigenous Australians are the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people of Australia, descended from groups that existed in Australia and surrounding islands prior to European colonisation. In present-day Australia these groups are divided into local communities. At the time of initial European settlement, over 250 languages were spoken, it is estimated that 120 to 145 of these remain in use. Aboriginal people today mostly speak English, with Aboriginal phrases and words being added to create Australian Aboriginal English, a population collapse following European settlement, and a smallpox epidemic spreading three years after the arrival of Europeans may have caused a massive and early depopulation. Since 1995, the Australian Aboriginal Flag and the Torres Strait Islander Flag have been among the flags of Australia. The word aboriginal has been in the English language since at least the 16th century, to mean, first or earliest known and it comes from the Latin word aborigines, derived from ab and origo. The word was used in Australia to describe its indigenous peoples as early as 1789 and it soon became capitalised and employed as the common name to refer to all Indigenous Australians. Strictly speaking, Aborigine is the noun and Aboriginal the adjectival form, however, use of either Aborigine or Aboriginal to refer to individuals has acquired negative connotations in some sectors of the community, and it is generally regarded as insensitive and even offensive. The more acceptable and correct expression is Aboriginal Australians or Aboriginal people, the term Indigenous Australians, which also includes Torres Strait Islander peoples, has found increasing acceptance, particularly since the 1980s. The broad term Aboriginal Australians includes many groups that often identify under names from local Indigenous languages. Anindilyakwa on Groote Eylandt off Arnhem Land, Palawah in Tasmania and these larger groups may be further subdivided, for example, Anangu recognises localised subdivisions such as Pitjantjatjara, Yankunytjatjara, Ngaanyatjarra, Luritja and Antikirinya. It is estimated that prior to the arrival of British settlers, the Torres Strait Islanders possess a heritage and cultural history distinct from Aboriginal traditions. The eastern Torres Strait Islanders in particular are related to the Papuan peoples of New Guinea, accordingly, they are not generally included under the designation Aboriginal Australians. This has been another factor in the promotion of the inclusive term Indigenous Australians. Six percent of Indigenous Australians identify themselves fully as Torres Strait Islanders, a further 4% of Indigenous Australians identify themselves as having both Torres Strait Islander and Aboriginal heritage. The Torres Strait Islands comprise over 100 islands which were annexed by Queensland in 1879, eddie Mabo was from Mer or Murray Island in the Torres Strait, which the famous Mabo decision of 1992 involved. The term blacks has been used to refer to Indigenous Australians since European settlement, while originally related to skin colour, the term is used today to indicate Aboriginal heritage or culture in general and refers to people of any skin pigmentation. In the 1970s, many Aboriginal activists, such as Gary Foley, proudly embraced the term black, the book included interviews with several members of the Aboriginal community including Robert Jabanungga reflecting on contemporary Aboriginal culture
10.
Matthew Flinders
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Captain Matthew Flinders RN was an English navigator and cartographer, who was the leader of the first circumnavigation of Australia and identified it as a continent. Flinders made three voyages to the ocean between 1791 and 1810. In the second voyage, George Bass and Flinders confirmed that Van Diemens Land was an island, in the third voyage, Flinders circumnavigated the mainland of what was to be called Australia, accompanied by Aboriginal man Bungaree. Heading back to England in 1803, Flinders vessel needed urgent repairs at Isle de France, although Britain and France were at war, Flinders thought the scientific nature of his work would ensure safe passage, but a suspicious governor kept him under arrest for more than six years. Flinders health had suffered, however, and although he reached home in 1810, he did not live to see the publication of his widely praised book and atlas, A Voyage to Terra Australis. Flinders was born in Donington, Lincolnshire, England, the son of Matthew Flinders, a surgeon, and his wife Susannah, née Ward. In his own words, he was induced to go to sea against the wishes of my friends from reading Robinson Crusoe, initially serving on HMS Alert, he transferred to HMS Scipio, and in July 1790 was made midshipman on HMS Bellerophon under Captain Pasley. By Pasleys recommendation, he joined Captain Blighs expedition on HMS Providence and this was also Blighs second Breadfruit Voyage following on from the ill-fated voyage of the Bounty. The passage between the Australian mainland and Tasmania enabled savings of several days on the journey from England, in honour of this discovery, the largest island in Bass Strait would later be named Flinders Island. The town of Flinders near the mouth of Western Port also commemorates Bass discovery of that bay, Flinders never entered Western Port, and passed Cape Schanck only on 3 May 1802. Flinders once more sailed the Norfolk, this time north on 17 July 1799 and he touched down at Pumicestone Passage, Redcliffe and Coochiemudlo Island and also rowed ashore at Clontarf. During this visit he named Redcliffe after the Red Cliffs, in March 1800, Flinders rejoined the Reliance and set sail for England. Banks used his influence with Earl Spencer to convince the Admiralty of the importance of an expedition to chart the coastline of New Holland. As a result, in January 1801, Flinders was given command of the Investigator, a 334-ton sloop, the Investigator set sail for New Holland on 18 July 1801. Attached to the expedition was the botanist Robert Brown, botanical artist Ferdinand Bauer, due to the scientific nature of the expedition, Flinders was issued with a French passport, despite England and France then being at war. On 17 April 1801, Flinders married his longtime friend Ann Chappelle and had hoped to bring her with him to Port Jackson, however the Admiralty had strict rules against wives accompanying captains. This is well documented in correspondence between Flinders and his benefactor, Sir Joseph Banks in May 1801. I have but time to tell you that the news of your marriage, the Lords of the Admiralty have heard also that Mrs. Flinders is on board the Investigator, and that you have some thought of carrying her to sea with you
11.
Seal hunting
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Seal hunting, or sealing, is the personal or commercial hunting of seals. Seal hunting is practiced in nine countries, Canada, the United States, Namibia, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Finland. Most of the seal hunting takes place in Canada and Greenland. Canadas largest market for seals is Norway, the Canadian Department of Fisheries and Oceans regulates the seal hunt in Canada. The DFO set harvest quotas of over 90,000 seals in 2007,275,000 in 2008,280,000 in 2009, and 330,000 in 2010. The actual kills in recent years have less than the quotas,82,800 in 2007,217,800 in 2008,72,400 in 2009. In 2007, Norway claimed that 29,000 harp seals were killed in its seal hunt, and Russia and Greenland claimed that 5,476 and 90,000 seals were killed in 2007, respectively. Harp seal populations in the northwest Atlantic declined to approximately 2 million in the late 1960s as a result of Canadas annual kill rates, conservationists demanded reduced rates of killing and stronger regulations to avert the extinction of the harp seal. An endangered seal is the Mediterranean monk seal, in 1971, the Canadian government responded by instituting a quota system. Because it was thought that the competitive element might cause sealers to cut corners, new regulations were introduced that limited the catch to 400 seals per day, a 2007 population survey conducted by the DFO estimated the population at 5.5 million. It is illegal in Canada to hunt newborn harp seals and young hooded seals, when the seal pups begin to molt their downy white fur at the age of 12–14 days, they are called ragged-jacket and can be commercially hunted. After molting, the seals are called beaters, named for the way they beat the water with their flippers, the hunt remains highly controversial, attracting significant media coverage and protests each year. Images from past hunts have become symbols for conservation, animal welfare. In 2009, Russia banned the hunting of harp seals less than one year old, the term seal is used to refer to a diverse group of animals. In science, they are grouped together in the Pinnipeds, which includes the walrus, not popularly thought of as a seal. The fur seal yields a valuable fur, the seal has no fur. Archeological evidence indicates the Native Americans and First Nations People in Canada have been hunting seals for at least 4,000 years, traditionally, when an Inuit boy killed his first seal or caribou, a feast was held. The meat was an important source of fat, protein, vitamin A, vitamin B12 and iron, the Inuit diet is rich in fish, whale, and seal
12.
Bushfires in Australia
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Bushfires in Australia are frequent events during the hotter months of the year, due to Australias mostly hot, dry climate. Each year, such fires impact extensive areas, on one hand, they can cause property damage and loss of human life. For thousands of years, Indigenous Australians have used fire to foster grasslands for hunting, major firestorms that result in severe loss of life are often named based on the day on which they occur, such as Ash Wednesday and Black Saturday. Other major conflagrations include the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires, the 2003 Eastern Victorian alpine bushfires, global warming is increasing the frequency and severity of bushfires. The term bushfire builds on the concept of the bush, referring to sparsely-inhabited regions, Bushfires in Australia are generally defined as uncontrolled, non-structural fires burning in a grass, scrub, bush, or forested area. Australia, being a geographically and meteorogically diverse continent, experiences many types of bushfires, there are two main categories, depending on local topography. Hilly/mountainous fires – burn in hilly, mountainous or alpine areas which are densely forested. The land is accessible and not conducive to agriculture, thus many of these densely forested areas have been saved from deforestation and are protected by national, state. The steep terrain increases the speed and intensity of a firestorm, where settlements are located in hilly or mountainous areas, bushfires can pose a threat to both life and property. Flat/grassland fires – burn along flat plains or areas of small undulation and these fires can move quickly, fanned by high winds in flat topography, and they quickly consume the small amounts of fuel/vegetation available. Many regions of predominantly flat terrain in Australia have been almost completely deforested for agriculture, the natural fire regime in Australia was altered by the arrival of humans. Fires became more frequent, and fire-loving species—notably eucalypts—greatly expanded their range and it is assumed that a good deal of this change came about as the result of deliberate action by early humans, setting fires to clear undergrowth or drive game. Plants have evolved a variety of strategies to survive bushfires, or even encourage fire as a way to eliminate competition from less fire-tolerant species, some native animals are also adept at surviving bushfires. In 2009, a standardised Fire Danger Rating was adopted by all Australian states, in 2010, following a national review of the bush fire danger ratings, new trigger points for each rating were introduced for grassland areas in most jurisdictions. See for example the following glossary Fire Danger Ratings are a feature of weather forecasts, Ratings are broadcast via newspapers, radio, TV, and the internet. The Australasian Fire Authorities Council is the body responsible for representing fire, emergency services. The Rural Fire Service Queensland is a volunteer-based firefighting agency and operates as part of the Queensland Fire, the New South Wales Rural Fire Service is a volunteer-based firefighting agency and statutory body of the Government of New South Wales. The Country Fire Service is a volunteer based service in the state of South Australia
