IN LATE 2014, Greg Roberts, a semi-retired journalist, was birdwatching along River Road in his local patch of Yandina on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. It was an area he thought he was familiar with. He’d known the freshwater wetlands near the eastern edge of the road to be a haven for a number of threatened species for two years, and had been lobbying the local council for its protection.

One day in November he ventured beyond the road and into the adjoining private land to survey the full extent of the wetlands. He was amazed by what he found. ‘Flocks of migratory shorebirds flew about; a pair of stately black-necked storks strutted their stuff; scores of egrets, spoonbills, pelicans and other waterbirds graced the horizon in every direction,’ he wrote on his blog sunshinecoastbirds.[i]