Plague Locust Control and Birds

BOCA has been actively seeking information on the potential impacts of Plague Locust control on birdlife. A short summary (106.47 kB) of our findings will be published in the August edition of The Bird Observer. For more information, go to the Australian Plague Locust Commission's website  or read their summary brochure here .

2010 is International Year of Biodiversity

Why is this of interest to BOCA and our members? Read this article (463.54 kB) from our May Bird Observer to find out.

Photo Gallery Open

Our new Photo Gallery is now displaying the latest photographs from our members - whether from PhotoBOCA or not. We encourage all BOCA and PhotoBOCA members to submit bird photographs for display in the gallery.

Green web serving

This website is now hosted by a company (Hostgator) that offsets 130% of its emissions with Renewable Energy Certificates, thus making a positive impact on the environment!

Bird Feeding Policy

BOCA has recently revised and re-issued its policy on bird feeding. You can read the new policy here.

Kelvin Thomson Speech to 2010 AGM

Kelvin Thomson (Federal Member for Wills) was the Guest Speaker at the AGM and gave an interesting speech on population growth and birds. The text is available here (29.86 kB).

Update on BA Talks

A letter has been sent to all BOCA and BA members regarding the progress of talks. The letter is available here (233.26 kB).

Membership payments now via PayPal

We can now accept on-line membership applications and renewals, as well as AFO subscriptions and donations via PayPal. Using PayPal enables us to receive money from you economically and means that we do not need to handle your credit card details on our website. You do not need to be a PayPal member to use the service as they accept major credit and debit cards. You can of course continue to make payments over the phone or by mail.

Working Group with Birds Australia to explore a unified organisation.

BOCA and BA have recently sent a letter to all their members explaining that talks are underway to explore the possibilities of joining forces, and we are seeking feedback - primarily of course from our members but also from other interested parties. You may read the letter that was sent BA BOCA Talks (694.89 kB).

Help Wanted!

BOCA relies greatly on the work of volunteers. If you are interested in volunteering contact National Office to register your interest.

We are currently looking for photographs to use in our article headers and in the sliding images on the Home page. We need JPEG files of 800px wide by 260px high. Since the sliding images crop photos on the right hand side when used on narrow screens it is better if the bird does not stretch to the extreme right of the image.

Notes on using the site

The website is configured for 3 screen widths - 1024, 1280 and variable. You can switch between them using the icons at the top right of the screen or the text links at the bottom of the screen.

You may also change font size, again using icons at the top of the screen.

There is a known issue that causes a login attempt to occasionally get the message "Session expired" - just re-try the login.

For BOCA members, login is by using their member number as username and their surname as password - as it was (and still is) on the old site. They may now change their password when logged in - although this will not change it on the original site. We will be allowing other people to register in the near future.

If you get any errors on links (usually giving an error screen with the code 404 and then taking you back to the home page) then an error email will be sent to the webmaster who will endeavour to fix it as soon as possible.