The Open Desk

Margie Beilharz

Freelance editor and writer in science, environment, education, health

Tag: biodiversity

  • Save the Winton Wetlands sea-eagles in seven days

    There are a gazillion conservation causes to donate to, but you don’t often get the chance to save two particular wild animals – let’s call them Seymour and Serena. They are a pair of white-bellied sea-eagles that nest at the Winton wetlands in north-east Victoria (a long way from the sea, despite their name). These wetlands are being restored (the biggest…

  • Citizen science: Deciphering old specimen notes for the Natural History Museum

    Here’s another citizen science project – especially for those who have a good eye for old-fashioned handwriting. The Natural History Museum in London is being helped by online volunteers who are transcribing old hand-written descriptions of the 780,000+ bird specimens in their collection. Some of the records date back to the 1830s but they were being handwritten…

  • Citizen science: measure 3D beak scans to help study bird evolution

    From your computer you can help Uni of Sheffield, UK, scientists study the evolution of biological diversity in birds. They are looking at beaks, which say a lot about a bird’s ecological niche (think hummingbird, toucan or pelican). The help they are after is marking ‘landmarks’ on 3D scans of beaks from birds in museum…

  • Decoy nest protects young yellow-rumped thornbills

    Decoy nest protects young yellow-rumped thornbills

    These little brown birds, seen flitting around woodlands and occasionally my garden, are clever architects whose nest deceives potential predators. I discovered this after I chose to write a piece on the yellow-rumped thornbill for the Bimblebox 153 Birds Project—a conservation meets art project highlighting the bird species recorded in Bimblebox Nature Refuge in Queensland, which is…

  • Write for conservation, and art

    I’ve picked the yellow-rumped thornbill to write about for the Bimblebox 153 Birds Project. 153 because they’ve recorded 153 bird species at Bimblebox Nature Reserve in central western Queensland (although their website now says 154). The privately owned high-biodiversity remnant woodland reserve is now under threat