 Denise Goodfellow spent some
of her childhood in the mallee country of South Australia where among the red sand
and grey-green bush she became fascinated by the semi desert animals.She shifted to the Northern Territory in 1975 and learnt useful skills that she hadn't picked up in the desert, like how to cast a net, to paddle a canoe and how to live among crocodiles. For a while she shot buffalo and then went to work in the remote bush as a biological consultant carrying out surveys of all flora and fauna, often alone. Learning bird calls meant that she could identify them while keeping her eyes on the ground for other animals and plants. Her knowledge of animal behaviour helped her in dealing with crocodiles, buffalo in her camp and venomous snakes. Elected to Darwin City Council as an alderman in 1981 she set about representing local Aboriginal people till then largely ignored by politicians. In an attempt to win their trust she accepted an invitation from an elder to catch a water snake in a large billabong inhabited by crocodiles. The Aboriginal people were horrified when she was threatened with prosecution for catching protected wildlife and made her 'whitefella-blackfella' in order to save her. She is the clan snake-hunter till this day. In the early 1980s she began taking out mostly American birdwatchers, but also others who wanted to see and learn about snakes, butterflies, plants and Aboriginal culture. Today Denise works as a biological and cross-cultural consultant with television. She also writes and illustrates fauna books and is presently working on her fourth.Below is a plate from her Birds of Darwin -- mangroves & mudflats.
As a member of a clan she has responsibilities to certain animals and the environnment in which they live. But overall her approach is probably best typified by the humour in her book Fauna of Kakadu and the Top End, and the two birdwatching soirees she organised for national television at the local sewage pond where about seventy Darwin residents turned up in evening dress, and gumboots. At this link to Amazon.com you can review and order her book Birds of Australia's Top End. Denise conducts the Birding and Natural History in the Far North, around Darwin tour. |
