Aussie Wildlife Show

Marie Munkara was born on the banks of the Mainoru River in Arnhemland. Author of several books including Of Ashes and Rivers that Run to the Sea and her first book Every Secret Thing, which won the 2008 David Unaipon Award and the 2010 NT Book of the Year.  Marie chats with us about her current doctoral thesis covering topics around her Arnhemland family, her peoples ancient history, myths, legends, tales of floods, sea level changes and much more.  

We catch up with Dr Charlie Manolis, Chief Scientist at Crocodylus Park and Wildlife Management International to find about some of the latest research in the conservation of these iconic and ancient reptiles. 

We visited the Territory Wildlife Park and caught up with the Manager of Visitor Experiences, Simon Ferguson for a chat.  The Territory Wildlife Park is situated on 400 ha of natural bushland, it contains native animals and plants representative of Northern Territory. It contributes to their conservation through research programs as well as through public education. The three main habitats represented are woodland, wetland and monsoon vine forest. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit!    

We chat with Dr Mark Hutchinson, Senior Research Scientist of Herpetology from the South Australian Museum about the recently discovered Western Desert Taipan, the endangered Pygmy Blue-tongue and all sort other sciencey goodness. 

Andrew Daly is a zookeeper with Taronga Zoo and Caroline Monro is a zookeeper at Wildlife Sydney Zoo. Together they form a conservation power-couple, bringing awareness to the plights of Australian wildlife and their habitats. They are also passionate about reducing their environmental footprint on the planet and have started a blog to share their journey. Click here to check out their blog, 'Greening Pains'.

We recently caught up with Dr Catherine Kemper at the South Australian Museum to learn more about her role as the Senior Researcher of Mammals. We also discuss whales, taxonomy, wildlife conservation and even the Thylacine gets a mention.    

We catch up with Emma Malik and chat about training native animals such as crocodiles and quolls, and we find out how a professional animal trainer becomes a professional comedian.  We saw Emma's show 'If you can't train it, eat it' and it was hilarious. Emma's other shows include 'Sticking with it' and even a children's show entitled 'Fee-Fi-Fo-Fun'. Click here for show dates 

We chat with Steve McKechnie, co-owner of Gorge Wildlife Park about living in a wildlife park, the park's history, and some of the new projects that are currently being worked on.   Gorge Wildlife Park is situated in the Adelaide Hills and hosts an array of native, as well as exotic species. It's an attractive park that offers opportunities to interact with koalas, kangaroos as well as other iconic Australian species. 

We delve deep into the world of aquatic serpents as we learn about sea snakes and sea kraits with evolutionary biologist Jenna Crowe-Riddell.  This episode was uploaded on the same day as the release of Jenna's paper on sea snakes, titled 'Phototactic tail: Evolution and molecular basis of a novel sensory trait in sea snakes'. Olive sea snake (Aipysurus laevis). Photo credit: Chris Malam.

Michael Bayliss is the Communications Manager for Sustainable Population Australia (SPA). SPA are an independent not-for-profit organisation seeking to protect the environment and our quality of life by ending population growth in Australia and globally. Click here to check the SPA Facebook page. Click here to check out the SPA website.