Thank you to Spark Shoalhaven's first featured local photographer, Shane Collins, for this stunning Cockatoo gallery, a reminder to us all to get out, get active and get involved in creating a healthy, equitable future for this place we call home.
Shane hails from St Georges Basin and targets Cockatoos that inhabit the thick coastal heathlands of his home area, especially glossy black cockatoos, a species under enormous pressure from habitat loss. Shane photographs throughout the Shoalhaven and Illawarra using a Canon R7 paired with a Sigma 150-600 mm lens.
"I find bird photography very challenging as every trip is an adventure and you never know what your result will be."
The town of Nowra is named after the Yuin name for yellow-tailed black cockatoo, 'Nou-woo-ro'. Mount Cambewarra is the site of the black cockatoo’s creation story of a white cockatoo that flew over a major bushfire and turned black. Photo gallery by Shane Collins
The Aboriginal custodians of the Shoalhaven landscape are using their knowledge of culture and country to rehabilitate glossy black cockatoos and their habitat following the 2019-20 bushfires. The Healthy Country for Glossy Black Cockatoos program surveys feeding and nesting environments to determine the impacts on the population and how to regenerate the birds' habitats.
We would love to publish more work from local photographers or artists. Don't hesitate to get in touch about submissions via spark@catholloway.com
Thanks to Birdlife Shoalhaven's Chris Grounds for his expertise and experience in correcting the Indigenous names for the black cockatoo species. The yellow-tailed black cockatoo is Nowra while glossy black is Ngaroora.
