Parties urged to save Boondall possums

I am responding to a front page article in the Northside Chronicle (April 7) highlighting the impending plight of possum gliders.

I think it is imperative that best efforts are made to save the squirrel glider possum colony in Boondall.

I was very upset to read that they may be sacrificed for an expanding housing estate in Holme Ave, Boondall.

I would like to appeal to the developer Villa World to let this colony live and develop housing in a less environmentally sensitive area.

Australian fauna such as these Possums are unique.

People need to respect this fact and try to keep them alive by protecting their habitat.

To destroy their habitat and ask Villa World to fund glider habitat elsewhere in Brisbane as compensation seems ludicrous when there is already an existing colony of these precious and delightful creatures.

It seems much more logical to retain this habitat of mature trees which have the hollows that provide possums with shelter and protection.

They are precious Australians too.

I would especially like to appeal to the Brisbane City Council councillors and administration to support the cause of saving this squirrel glider possum colony.

Margaret Pickering, Bracken Ridge.

Bouquet for coverage

I wish to express our group's appreciation for the coverage your newspaper has given to the plight of a colony of squirrel glider possums.

Brisbane City Council continues to take money from ratepayers for bushland levies to buy privately-owned bushland. Yet, the council is poised to destroy a large, pristine bushland/wetland area with squirrel glider colonies it owns at Boondall.

The council last year called for expressions of interest to develop this area called the Western Extension to the Boondall Wetlands, which exists adjacent and to the south of the entertainment centre.

While council is taking ratepayers' money with one hand, it is selling, developing or destroying our council-owned bushland, habitat and wildlife with the other hand, and continues to help developers destroy Brisbane native wildlife and a once-magnificent green belt.

Our group only hopes Brisbane ratepayers and residents remember these non-green actions of our Lord Mayor come voting time next year.

Barry Wilson, spokesman, Save Our Squirrel Gliders Possums Committee.

Northside Chronicle Wed 21, April, 1999 page 5

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