Gavin Gatenby

Sound UP! When a gang of young male Superb Lyrebirds surround you, often within less than a metre. I zoomed back to 80mm but often had to lean back to get this footage. I've left it largely unedited to capture the mayhem of the moment. #birds #birding #nature #lyrebirds

Would be nice to think so, but most unlikely I think.

I used to read Stan Grant’s columns in the SMH, but they were usually a grab-bag of quotes from “great thinkers” and philosophers - sort of ersatz wisdom. BTW, a couple of decades back TV insiders reckoned Stan was the model for the vapid TV anchorman Mike Moore in the series ‘Frontline’.

News story on AI falsely identifying someone as a murderer + story on cyber insecurity at banks

Two stories on one page of today’s @sydmorningherald.bsky.social which show why AI and the digital world needs to be treated with scepticism

That's the Jeffery Epstein Memorial Ballroom and Massage Parlour ...

Hope you all are having a blessed Thursday

Ha ha! I knew Andrew was finished shortly after the Epstein paedophilia story broke when I was listening to the BBC news and in impeccable BBC intonation the female newsreader referred to him not as "Prince Andrew" but as "Andrew, one of the Queen's sons".

Found over most of Aust, Maned ducks mostly eat soft green grass and so have done extremely well out of European agriculture and even urban areas. They nest in tree hollows and have huge broods – sometimes as many as 12 ducklings who stay with their parents for months. #WildOz #birds #birdwatching

Image of a Sabco brand hand broom made from wood and horse hair. It's from the mid 1960s and is still in use.

This Aust-made painted timber and horse hair Sabco brush has been in the family since the mid-1960s. Now relegated to workshop use, it's still in excellent condition after over 60 years. Remarkably, Sabco still make them. The modern cheap plastic brushed deteriorate quickly.

Watt actually looks like what he is: a time-serving right-wing Labor apparatchik from Central Casting. Probably has bugger-all knowledge of ecology and the environment.

There’s something very fishy about those responses. They’re rather too articulate in a strange way. We have no way of knowing if this is a genuine Vox pop or what people rejected from the selection might have said. Might these people be actors?

Saw it when I was young. Great movie! Very influential at the time.

One of Ukraine’s long range strikes on Russian military infrastructure a couple of days ago. Tightening the screws on Putin …

As Tony Abbott thinks oral history isn’t reliable, I guess he’ll now stop believing in the Gospels which weren’t written down for many years after the events described, and not by the participants

Who the hell does this utter ignoramus think he is, wanting to give away to an outrageous aggressor what isn’t his to give away?

Just a moron, and a compromised one.

This sort of spontaneous resistance to Trump’s notorious ICE “police” — actually now a private fascist militia — is going on all over the US, but Australia’s mainstream media are barely covering the story. Shameful really.

Absolutely! I was appalled when I accessed it today. Very dumb and difficult.

It wasn’t a “peace plan”, it was a “get Ukraine to capitulate plan”. Ukraine isn’t going to capitulate because for Ukrainians this is an existential struggle. In reality it’s Putin and Trump who are now deep in crisis.

2026 will see the start of local construction of Redback tracked Infantry Fighting Vehicles (IFV) and Huntsman 155mm Self Propelled Howitzers (SPH).

A significant boost to Australia’s military heavy engineering capabilities.
#auspol #ADF

www.theaustralian.com.au/special-repo...

Climate warming

Not even summer - a heatwave sweeping across Australia is already putting lives and property at risk

Severe heat produces health issues even potentially, deaths, bushfires threaten lives, property and insurance rates

𝐀𝐫𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲 𝐲𝐞𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐕𝐎𝐓𝐄 𝐮𝐫𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐧𝐭 𝐜𝐥𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞?

Many years ago I was at the Kurringai National Park lookout overlooking the Hawkesbury R when a huge Lace Monitor came ambling through. A Brush Turkey approached it and I readied my camera expecting to see it eat the turkey, but instead the bird bit it on the tail and drove it away!

Great story!

Which raises the obvious question: how much intel generated by Australian agencies or by US agencies at Pine Gap is the Trump/Krasnov White House leaking to Putin?

Four frames. Reporter with Albo. Frame 1: Reporter: “So, they get considerable control over our critical minerals sector…?” Albo: “Yep.” 2. Reporter: “…ensuring that we can keep paying them billions for submarines we may never get…” Albo: “That’s right”. Frame 3: Reporter:”…and we can ignore their slide into fascistic autocracy with no regard for the rule of law…?” Albo: “Uh-huh.” Frame 4: Reporter: “Astonishing.” Albo: “People often underestimate me.”

What a deal.
My @smh @theage cartoon.

Mate, there's a typo there: "work".

Australian super funds quietly fuelling Israel’s war machine Beneath the surface of moral posturing, Australian retirement funds are helping keep Israel’s war economy alive.

Australian super funds quietly fuelling Israel’s war machine https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/australian-super-funds-quietly-fuelling-israels-war-machine,20290?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=IA_Feed #Auspol

Yes. And if Putin falls, there’s no obvious successor.

He knows there’s no way Putin will fly to Budapest if there’s a chance he’ll be interdicted overflying NATO airspace, arrested on the ICC warrant and sent to The Hague for trial. The proposed meeting was a desperate try-on.

Fico is a quisling.