AS patrons of Keep Australia Beautiful the Governor General David Hurley and Mrs Linda Hurley attended to present the King Island-hosted 2023 National Awards.

A program was designed to show them King Island sights and to meet with King Islanders formally at a lunchtime civic reception at the Town Hall and a public informal meet and greet at the Boat House at Currie Harbour.

On arrival, they met with Mayor Marcus Blackie for a private catchup.

Mr Blackie served as the Governor General’s personal assistant when the Governor General commanded the 1st Brigade from 1999-2000 in Darwin supporting Australian-led operations in East Timor.

The reception was low-key and relaxed and finger food was catered by Salt & Thyme.

The Governor General and Mrs Hurley, following brief speeches praising the island’s landscapes and plane approach views, mentioning past relationships with the mayor and his wife Narelle, circulated and chatted easily with invited guests.

Mrs Hurley did surprise a few when she introduced a sing-along, You are My Sunshine, which she is known to do in Canberra. The King Island chorus sang with gusto albeit surprised and some bemused.

The couple toured and tasted at the King Island Dairy and staff loaded the RAAF plane to take King Island cheese back to Canberra. The couple made themselves available to the broader community at the Boat House.

It was a small turnout at the Boat House, but for those who attended were able to engage in longer conversation.

Not everyone can say that Australia’s Head of State sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to them – but Jenny Marshall can now put that in her memoirs.

A surprise element was a presentation by Lion Linda Payne of two King Island Passports.

“You have a red passport, then there’s the green passport and the common blue passport, but these are rare King Island passports and very few people are issued with these and will give you passage to return one day to King Island,” she said.

Elizabeth Beveridge, aged 5, just wanted to meet the Governor General.

As he crouched down and chatted to her, he presented her with an Australian Government Coronation medallion keepsake.

The rain held off and the King Island sunshine didn’t go away as the entourage left to prepare for the evening’s Keep Australia Beautiful event and King Island residents quickly disappeared before the grey skies closed in for the night.

OUR little island is home to a subspecies of Australia’s largest honey eater, but it is now classified as endangered.

Lack of suitable habitat is the main reason for low numbers along with vegetation destruction, which is an ongoing problem on King Island.

The bird is the Yellow Wattlebird, noting that the male and female are similar in appearance with the female being slightly smaller.

Both have long pendulous yellow wattles (skin flaps) which hang from a point below and behind both eyes.  White streaks above and below the eye are noticeable.

The crown has white and brown feathers running over the back of his neck where they meet the brown, white-edged back feathers.

The belly is pale to bright yellow with flecks of brown streaks.

 The tail is long and slender with white tips, as are the wing feathers, the legs a pinkish colour and the short, curved bill is black. Juveniles are a plain greyish-brown colour, darker above and lighter below.

The bird was observed by Archibald Campbell, in the November 1887 Victorian Field Naturalists’ Expedition, along with Green and McGarvie in 1971.

 They noted it was mostly to be found in eucalypt forests. Over the last 50 years, these forests have continued to decline, often due to illegal practices. 

The voice of the Yellow Wattlebird is quite distinctive and is often heard while the bird goes unobserved in the dense canopy. It is described in various ways including loud guttural gurgles, croaks like coughing or vomiting or a raucous kuk, kukuk noise. This is very different to most Australian songbirds who have a pleasant melodic voice.

The Yellow Wattlebird feeds mainly on the nectar of eucalyptus and banksias. It also eats fruit and insects and forages under bark at all levels of the canopy, from the top of trees to near ground level. It is known to visit gardens and orchards to feed on introduced fruits and flowers on an opportunistic basis and occasionally will forage on the ground.

Their habitat is generally dense scrub with a mixture of species which includes gum and banksia. When building nests, the birds usually choose a place high in a tree. The nest consists of a large untidy lot of twigs, bark and leaves woven into a cup shape lined with feathers and fine grasses. Two to three eggs are laid during the breeding season from late August through to January. Incubation is about twenty days, and the chicks are naked when they hatch. Both males and females help with parenting duties.

The Yellow Wattlebird will defend its territory ruthlessly and noisily chase away any unwanted birds who may be a threat. At Nugara, in 2015, I watched a Yellow Wattlebird dash out of the scrub and latch onto the tail of a Forest Raven that flew too close. This may have happened more than once as the Forest Raven had a lot of very tatty tail feathers.

The Yellow Wattlebird loves to bathe, especially in warmer weather. On a balmy summer afternoon many years ago, I watched a Yellow Wattlebird bathing in a cattle trough, near Currie. The bird dived right under the water, then flew to a nearby fence post, lightly preened the feathers then back and into the water again. He did this several times and while saturated flew off. I expect he was going to give himself a good preen and dry out his feathers.

To me, the longevity of this species and many like it is down to us – reduce habitat destruction.

The King Island Golf and Bowling Club kitchen run by Tegan Harris had a big job ahead of them last Friday night when King Island hosted the National Keep Australia Beautiful – Australian Tidy Towns Sustainability Awards.

A full house had arrived on King Island from Australia’s far-flung places.

Kirsty Russell looked after the setup, bar and floor with her son Oscar Russell and Jorja Scott bartending. Tegan Harris, Codi Rooks and Amanda Hudson prepped and cooked in the kitchen, and were ably supported by Maddison Hudson out on the floor.

Councillor Anna Hely, a tourism operator and member of various committees was MC, on a night with lots of awards, names and unfamiliar faces.

 As patron of KAB Governor General David Hurley presented the awards and in his address, he spoke of the value of service in a community and noted that many of the projects were initiated and developed by volunteers.

Mayor Marcus Blackie welcomed the visitors and commended all finalists for their projects and achievements.

 As host, King Island also had the task of creating the overall winner’s trophy. This was made by Jim Benn.

The unique goblet is made from King Island macrocarpa and is mounted on a piece of salvaged timber from the 1867 Europa shipwreck.

The Western Australian finalist, Gascoyne Junction was the overall winner of the 2023 Australian Tidy Towns Sustainability Awards.

The finalist for Tasmania, Oatlands was awarded joint winner of the Heritage and Culture category and highly commended in the Environmental Sustainability – Natural Environment Management and Community Health, Wellbeing and Interest categories.

King Island TV live-streamed the event and the Junction Hotel in remote Gascoyne W.A joined with the finalist communities in Euroa Victoria, Scone NSW, Mt Liebig, NT, Oatlands Tasmania and other states to be part of the awards night.

King Island represented Tasmania in the National Awards and was declared the overall winner in 2022.

As Australia’s Grand Final winner, the island hosted Friday night’s event.

Keep Australia Beautiful chief executive Val Southam commended all the finalists.

“It is clear from the quality of projects entered in the National Awards Program that communities are passionate, committed, driven, and dedicated to making their communities special in every way.”

I RECENTLY visited King Island for work. It was the first time back on the island in 40 years and ten of my classmates from King Island District High School (1972) still live there. My partner and I met up with eight of them for dinner at the Golf Club for a long awaited reunion.

My family lived on King Island in the 60s and early 70s at the Butter Factory where my father Keith was the mechanic. We lived there with my mother Shirley (dec), brother Andy, and sisters Jane, Lisa, and Joanne. I left the island in 1973 when I was 15 to join the Navy where I served for 33 years.

I now live in West Ulverstone, where I work for the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

My family moved to Melbourne in the mid ‘seventies but we remained connected to the island through David and Sheila Sweeting, my uncle and aunty, both now deceased.

The ABS asked me to go to the island to conduct some surveys and hopefully, I will have the opportunity again should some more samples be included.

MUMMIES, mums, mamas, nannas, grans, grannies grandmas, nonnas, and omas, were celebrated in many ways last Sunday.

King Island mums received children’s handmade gifts and cards, and maybe breakfast in bed and a day of leisure.

Some families held a beach barbecue others breakfasted or lunched in Currie at the Larder, the King Island Hotel, had a leisurely wine at Legs, or made their way to Grassy for lunch or dinner at the Grassy Tavern and Wild Harvest with dining entertainment provided by past resident Charles Pearce who flew back to the island, with his wife Ros for the weekend.

Some took a weekend escape and for others it was a day just like all others.

Social media reflected a broader conversation. Posts shared a day of recognition, gratitude and support.

Posts also reminded us that it can be a day of sorrow and loss. Mums of all ages were remembered for being forces of love, care and protection but in a rapidly changing world mothers and mothering included newer and broader thoughts about mothers and acknowledged leadership, strength, softness, survival and choices.

Facetime, Messenger, Zoom and other video technologies are now commonplace and are regularly replacing the telephone and over the weekend linked older, younger and new mums to their mums located not only around Australia but also around the world.

KING Island will host the National Keep Australia Awards on May 19 with finalists coming from around Australia and KAB patrons Governor General David Hurley and Mrs Linda Hurley.

Last year King Island was declared National KAB overall winner.

A program has been designed to show them some King Island sights and to meet local islanders.

The Governor General and Mayor Marcus Blackie have a personal connection.

Mr Blackie served as his personal assistant when the Governor General commanded the 1st Brigade from 1999-2000 in Darwin, supporting Australian-led operations in East Timor.

The Governor-General visit program is confirmed as follows: 10.50am: Arrive at King Island via RAAF jet.

11:30 am – Noon: Reunion with Mayor Marcus Blackie.

Noon -1.30pm: Civic Reception at Council Chambers. (invitation only).

1.30pm – 3pm: Visit to King Island Dairy

3pm- 4.30pm: Meet the King Island public @ The Boathouse. (public, visitors and school students are invited to attend please park at the Harbour and walk around via the grass track or park at the top of the boathouse hill and walk down).

4.30pm – 6pm: Rest 6pm -9 pm: Keep Australia Beautiful National Awards Dinner at King Island Golf Club. (invitation only).

9:20pm: Depart King Island via RAAF jet.

THERE was a good turnout on the team sheet and crowd for the unseasonably warm North home game as they took on Currie for the first time this season.

Abraham, Sam, and James Shires played on permit with their cousins, Jeremy, Justin, and Jye Summers, and what a difference they made to the North side.

Currie struggled for numbers an hour before the game, but by the time the game started, they had managed to gather 15 players.

Keenan Fanning and Tyler Smith contested the ruck first, with North getting the first forward entry, which was quickly retrieved by Ben Doherty for Currie, out to Tom Graham but didn’t make it past the centre with some heavy hits to open the game.

The opening minutes established a rapid pace, clean hands, and pressure football. James Shires for North got the first shot on goal for only a minor score. Kayden Barnes for Currie marked 30m out in front but sprayed it out on the full.

The hard and fast play and the game’s intensity were like the previous week, but neither team could take an accurate hit. Currie finally found a goal through Nathan Allen.

Taylor Cook to Justin Summers who ran through the centre to Fanning and into Blaze Mallinson for another shot, which was marked on the line by Currie. It was sent forward, and Jar- rod Williams (Boze) scored the goal.

Apart from a little sun in the eyes, it was perfect footballing weather, with Currie kicking straight and getting themselves a second goal while North was still unable to find the big sticks.

Blaze got North’s first on the run. The tackling pressure for the first quarter was first-class, and the match- ups were even. Currie went into the first quarter break four points ahead. North opened the second quarter quickly with a goal, followed by another. to begin the quarter.

All the play was in the North for- ward line, putting the Currie defence under pressure. Dale Ellis to Jeremy Summers (Jez) in the North for- ward line on a 45-degree angle for a behind, but the ball didn’t make it out of the Currie defence before being turned over and turned into another North goal.

Jez got another chance shortly after his behind, and this time didn’t miss. North had all the momentum in the second quarter.

Doug Cox to Jack Worrall skirted around the Currie 50 before they could only get it slightly inside to Tom Graham, who tested his full measure, but the ball was touched on the line.

Joel Williams (Mole) in a relentless tackle after the kick-in was rewarded with a free and saw it through against the flow of play.

Currie immediately got another forward entry for a poster. Dillon Beecroft had a piece of everything on Saturday. North got it quickly through the centre and caught Cur- rie’s defenders snoozing and gave James Shires a shot 30m out in front for a goal.

The play returned to a more even, contested, athletic, high-skill foot- ball midfield, but North continued to find a way forward and kicked out to a 19-point lead. Currie ran down a man in the centre, and quickly, Beecroft jet- ted off with the ball, centring to Mole, who kicked a classy goal, but North went into the long break 22 points up.

Jez opened the quarter with a behind, and Worrall got a big kick out that went straight into a contested pack and came back North’s way, but Currie’s defence mopped up again, and this time Currie got a forward entry to no avail.

Kicking, marking, and contested high balls marked the beginning of the third quarter. Ned, playing forward for North took it in the pocket and with quick feet centred to Jez who moved it for- ward to James Shires who goaled.

The Currie backline was under pressure all afternoon and held up well. Another goal for James Shires.

A game highlight occurred down the shed’s side when Tom Graham and Justin Summers engaged in a great foot race that saw North go forward for another and put North 47 points up at lemons.

North opened the last with another goal, a strength class at Finn earlier in the week obviously worked wonders…