HOPE IS ACTION

DANCE

22 June

Recently landed: Hope is Action

Gracia’s written response to Ghenoa Gela’s Gurr Era Op, with Force Majeure in association with Ilbijerri Theatre Company, especially for Fjord Review.

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The Australian Museum Mammalogy Collection holds ten specimens of the Bramble Cay Melomys collected from 1922–24, when they were in abundance. One hundred years later, a familiar photo of a wide-eyed, mosaic-tailed Melomys, the first mammal to become extinct due to the impacts of climate change, greets me as I enter the Arts House foyer. A small, nocturnal mammal with a heavy title, rising sea levels lead to the destruction of their secluded habitat, as saltwater intrusions ate away at the coral cay (small, low island).[i] Losing 97% of the herbaceous vegetation, which would have provided the Bramble Cay Melomys with protection and food, through inaction and political floundering, we sealed their fate.[ii]

While it might be too late to save the burrowing rodent with a prehensile tail tip, who coexisted with many shorebirds (noddies, boobies, and turns), it is not too late, to speak up for those that remain, like the green turtles and other bird species[iii], whose nests are being washed away. It is not too late, urges Ghenoa Gela, the creator, writer, and performer, of Gurr Era Op, to write a letter to the Minister for the Environment asking for stronger “environmental laws to protect our lands, plants and animals from extinction.” Gela’s personal message in the foyer sets the tone. To my left, the Bramble Cay Melomys fixes me with an imploring look, as I am offered tea to help warm myself from the inside out. “My Ata (Dad’s Dad) used to live with them on our sacred island. It’s just devastating that they will no longer be there but also that their extinction is a telling sign of the seriousness of the rising waters here in Australia.”

[i] In 1983 it was reported that the cay located on the north-western edge of the reef, was moving towards the north-west at a rate of 0.44 m per year and in time could ‘drop off the reef flat into deeper water’. Available evidence indicates that the anthropogenic climate change-induced impacts of sea-level rise, coupled with an increased frequency and intensity of weather events that produced damaging storm surges and extreme high water levels, particularly during the decade 2004 to 2014, were most likely responsible for the extirpation of the species from Bramble Cay. The Minister approved the listing advice and transferred the species from the Endangered to Extinct category, effective from 22nd February, 2019. Threatened Species Committee Listing Advice for the Bramble Cay Melomys (Melomys ruicola), https://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/threatened/species/pubs/64477-listing-advice-22022019.pdf, accessed 14th June, 2024.

[ii] Ian Gynther, Natalie Waller and Luke K.-P. Leung, ‘Confirmation of the extinction of the Bramble Cay Melomys (Melomys rubicola) on Bramble Cay, Torres Strait: results and conclusions from a comprehensive survey in August–September 2014’, https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/view/55651146/bramble-cay-melomys-survey-report, accessed 14th June, 2024.

[iii] Brendan Mounter, ‘Torres Strait artists give extinct native rodent new life while flagging first climate change loss’, ABC News, 19th August, 2021, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-19/bramble-cay-melomys-revived-through-art/100386670, accessed 14th June, 2024.