A visually lush odyssey into the continent’s wild country to discover more about the lives of brolgas, Australia’s only endemic crane.

On assignment in outback Australia, wildlife photographer and writer Mitch Reardon encounters a rancher whose infectious desire to protect the habitat of Australia’s only native crane, the Brolga, inspires him to go on a journey to find these magnificent birds. Brolga Country records Reardon’s progress through some of Australia’s wildest and most remote country, from the wilderness of Cape York Peninsula where the sprawling rivers, billabongs, lakes and swamps of Lakefield National Park support vast assemblages of wetland birds to Bool Lagoon in South Australia, the last stronghold of the southern Brolgas.

Once widespread throughout the mainland’s wetlands, these magnificent birds have almost disappeared from their southern range. Ecologists recognise the Brolga as an ‘umbrella’ species a species whose conservation could protect numerous other animals and plants, because its needs match those of so many others, including ourselves. Reardon’s understanding of the complexities involved in balancing conservation with the needs of human productivity provides valuable insight and some of the practical applications he cites throw up unexpected solutions.

Brolga Country touches upon the interconnectedness of all things, and makes a case for enlightened co-existence between people and the natural world. pp. 174 illusts First Edition #0619