News & Outreach

Outreach: Imagining Lonsdale Park: turning roads into parks could be the renewal our city needs
The pandemic has underlined an important truth of city life: urban nature is essential infrastructure. Life in lockdown reminded us that urban parks don’t just

Outreach: A Victorian logging company just won a controversial court appeal. Here’s what it means for forest wildlife
Brendan Wintle, The University of Melbourne; Laura Schuijers, The University of Melbourne, and Sarah Bekessy, RMIT University Australia’s forest-dwelling wildlife is in greater peril after

Outreach: Moving cars key to revival
Bringing life back to our gritty, windswept CBD is a daunting task, but we’re starting to see what works… Read more

Outreach: 4 ways our streets can rescue restaurants, bars and cafes after coronavirus
Nils Versemann/Shutterstock Thami Croeser, RMIT University As Australia re-opens, the bars, cafes and restaurants that give life to our streets face a tough ask: stay

Where the wild things are: how nature might respond as coronavirus keeps humans indoors
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. Intriguing things sometimes happen in places deserted by people.

Outreach: Nurturing nature, designing a home with biodiversity in mind
Sarah Bekessy, Georgia Garrard, Sarrah Hurley, Casey Visintin, Freya Thomas & Holly Kirk There’s a lot you can do to promote biodiversity when you’re designing
Archive
Bekessy S.A., Kusmanoff A., Gordon A., Gregg E., Thomas F., Garrard G., Kirk H., Ringma J., Berthon K., Kidd L., Gutiérrez M., Hardy M., Selinske M., Sharma R. (2019) How should I vote if I care about preventing the extinction of nature? Published in The Conversation, 16 May 2019. Available at: https://theconversation.com/how-should-i-vote-if-i-care-about-preventing-the-extinction-of-nature-117197
Hardy M.J., Bekessy S.A., Fitzsimons J.A., Gordon A. (2018) Revolving Private Land to Conserve Nature. Australasian Science, May 2018. Available at: https://www.australasianscience.com.au/article/issue-mayjune-2018/revolving-private-land-conserve-nature.html
Cranney K, Bekessy SA, Mata L. (2017) The Little Things that Run the City – 30 amazing insect that live in Melbourne! City of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
Damiens FLP, Mumaw L, Backstrom A, Bekessy SA, Coffey B, Faulkner R, Garrard GE, Hardy MJ, Kusmanoff AM, Mata L, Rickards L, Selinske MJ, Torabi N, Gordon A. (Online, 13 March 2017) Why politics and context matter in conservation policy: a response to Kareiva and Fuller. Global Policy 8: 253-256.
Hardy MJ, Fitzsimons J, Bekessy SA, Gordon A. (2017) Swings & roundabouts, & private land conservation Decision Point 102, October 2017.
Hardy MJ, Fitzsimons J, Bekessy SA, Gordon A. (2017) An agreement forever or not worth the paper they’re written on? Decision Point 97, August 2016.
Fraser H, Garrard GE, Rumpff L, Hauser C, McCarthy MA. (2016) What’s in a name? Decision Point 94, January 2016.
Garrard GE, Bekessy SA. (2016) EcoCheck: Victoria’s flower-strewn western plains could be swamped by development. The Conversation, 17 May 2016.
Hardy MJ, Bekessy SA, Gordon A, Fitzsimons JA. (2016) An Agreement Forever? Australasian Science, November 2016.
Kusmanoff AM. (2016) Strategic framing for landholder engagement. Decision Point 98, November 2016.
Kusmanoff AM, Fiona F, Bekessy SA. (2016) What effect will closet Trump voters have on the US Election? The Conversation, 2 November 2016.
Kusmanoff AM, Garrard GE, Mata L, Bekessy SA. (2016) Getting smarter about city lights is good for us and nature too. The Conversation, 16 December 2016.
Mata L. (2016) The Little Things that Run the City. Wild Melbourne, 9 November 2016.
Garrard GE. (2015) Detectability, threatened species and environmental impact assessments. Decision Point 92, September 2015.
Garrard GE, Amati M, Baracco M, Bekessy SA, Ednie-Brown P, Horwill C, Wijen S, Ware J. (2015) Linking Ecology and Architecture. RMIT University. Melbourne, Australia.
Garrard GE, Bekessy SA, van Wijnen S. (2015) Sustainable mid-rise for healthy, connected communities. Planning News 41: 6.
Garrard GE, Bekessy SA, Wintle BA. (2015) Offset policies don’t work – So maybe we should be weighing up the alternatives. Decision Point 91, August 2015.
Garrard GE, Wintle BA, Bekessy SA. (2015) Casting a critical eye over biodiversity offsets. Australasian Science 36: 48.
Gordon A. (2015) Step forward then look back – Using ‘backcasting’ to improve conservation and offsets policy. Decision Point 91, August 2015.
Maron M, Gordon A. (2015) Could well-designed offset policies actually increase loss? – Perverse incentives may yield unintended biodiversity outcomes. Decision Point 91, August 2015.
Maron M, Gordon A, Mackey BG, Possingham HP, Watson JEM. (2015) Stop misuse of biodiversity offsets. Nature 523: 401–403. doi: 10.1038/523401a
McCarthy MA, Garrard GE, Rumpff L. (2015) The alpine grazing debate was never about science. The Conversation, April 2015.
Fidler F, Gordon A. (2013) Science is in a reproducibility crisis – how do we resolve it? The Conversation, 20 September 2013.
Garrard GE. (2013) Detecting species without species-specific guides: A new, trait-based model of detectability. Decision Point 66.
Gordon A, Bekessy SA. (2013) Weighing up the costs of collaboration. Decision Point 73, September 2013.
Maron M, Gordon A. (2013) Biodiversity offsets could be locking in species decline. The Conversation, 6 June 2013.
Gordon A. (2012) The origin of the universe: is there a role for God? The Conversation, 19 April 2012.
Mata L. (2012) Hidden helpers. Australian Turfgrass Management Journal 14.5: 7-9.
Garrard GE, Rumpff L. (2011) Science the loser in Victoria’s alpine grazing trial. The Conversation, 24 March 2011.
Gordon A. (2011) Biodiversity offsets: solving the habitat-saving equation. The Conversation, 24 November 2011.
Garrard GE. (2009) How hard do we need to look to find threatened species? Decision Point 34.