Keeping Wildlife Safe at Home – Options

Interested in helping our native wildlife to have safer lives? Here are a number of the small to major options to help wildlife safe in their rightful homes, i.e. their natural habitat. Some of the small options are useful in urban areas too. Hopefully, these options provide a starting point for a discussion with your councillors and council team if you seek to improve conditions for wildlife.

Also, there is usually a need for assisting with counting and monitoring wildlife too in your local area. Please also take the time to check if your council already has a biodiversity report for the wildlife most in need in your LGA. If not, then ask why not? and look for your state advice / reports.

Some councils already have a few wildlife sky bridges / other solutions – why not ask your council team about these and locations? Most often, cost is the most prohibitive factor, and to change and improve situations for our wildlife will take lobbying your council and state/ territory government.

Help your local wildlife enjoy a safer life in their home / natural habitat.

Latest rope bridge – Ku-ring-gai

A very recent rope bridge for a range of wildlife has been installed on an often used road that runs alongside a native park in Sydney, and then the major part through a number of very leafy north shore suburbs.

If this can be achieved in one council local government area, let’s see if we can find out the costs to build, and then promote a business case/ proposal for more in every council area?

Some councils already have a few wildlife sky bridges / other solutions – why not ask your council team about these and locations? Usually cost is the most prohibitive factor, and to change and improve situations for our wildlife will take lobbying your council and state/ territory government.

Virtual fences – trial at Eurobodalla proving effective (<80km & after dark)

23 September 2023 the Eurobodalla council provided an update which includes:

“It was the first road in NSW where the virtual fencing was trialled. In the eight months after installation of the virtual fence, only five animals were killed. Recently, the fence had some teething issues and lost power, most likely caused by insufficient solar charging in winter because of overshadowing by trees. In just two weeks four animals were killed, highlighting how effective it is when fully operational…

“One unfortunate limitation of the virtual fence is they don’t work in areas where the speed limit is faster than 80 km/hr because cars pass too quickly for the virtual fence to be effective.”

There are benefits in reducing the number of animals injured or killed, however, there are constraints to these fences:

these only operate after dark when cars have their headlights on to trigger the devices
there is a constraint that vehicles are travelling under 80km/hour
there is limited opportunities for wildlife to “learn” as if the wildlife doesn’t respond to the warning sound the consequences are often lethal.

Fauna Crossings offer a range of tunnel and bridge solutions

The LRC team has been following this Aussie company for a few years – they provide a range of solutions, one of the largest was a sky bridge across 80 metres! Showing that a range of solutions is possible for a range of our wildlife.

They have a “brochure”, which may be a great starting point with local councils and discussing with native wildlife support groups to assess where is the most need?

Conservation Fencing, “please fence us in!”

“Standing at 1.8m tall, the steel fences initially look unfinished – but it is all part of the purpose.
…“the top of the fence is deliberately floppy. It’s designed this way to stop cats from getting in. If one was to climb the fence, the floppy top is unstable, and their body weight is enough to make the floppy top sag down and they will strike the two energized wires.”

(Note: the latter likely impacts other animals not just feral cats)

There is also another supplier Waratah, and possibly more providing appropriate fencing.

Major infrastructure wildlife overpasses & under passes

Interestingly, there have been major overpasses and underpasses built in regional areas, and this first one in Sydney is still currently being built.

Cost is a significant factor, and to retrograde is allegedly even more expensive. However, what options were considered? Were simpler options considered?