#FloraAndFaunaFriday: Lord Howe Island’s Woodhen - Flagship for a Brave Island

Back in 2015, when I visited Lord Howe Island as Australia’s Threatened Species Commissioner, I lay on the grass and met the island’s shy little rail. The endangered Lord Howe Island Woodhen. That day the community was weighing a courageous choice: to go ahead with comprehensive aerial and ground baiting to remove invasive rats and mice. It was never going to be easy, but the islanders chose to back Nature. The operation went ahead in 2019, and it has changed everything.

Four years on, the transformation is profound. More than 30 threatened species are rebounding, and the Woodhen population has more than tripled to over 1,200 birds. This is an astonishing comeback for a bird that once hovered on the brink.

The island was officially declared rodent-free in 2023 after years of intensive monitoring - another milestone earned through community grit and science working hand in hand. And the Woodhen, who's eggs were being eaten by all the rats, is just the flag-bearer. From palms and ferns to invertebrates and seabirds, Lord Howe Island species are reclaiming their niches. Even the celebrated Lord Howe Island Phasmid now has a pathway home because its greatest land predator has been removed.

I’m coming back this week, this time with Lyrebird Dreaming. We'll be volunteering and learning alongside locals like Ian Hutton who's a tireless champion Nature. I can’t wait to be on the ground with Ian and the community again. Watch this space over the next week for my posts from the island.

For me, this story is everything Lyrebird Dreaming stands for: country and community coming together. We’re not in this for profit or bank accounts. We’re in it for places and communities like Lord Howe Island. And for people brave enough to do the right thing, even when it’s hard.

Me ten years younger, meeting two Woodhens when their recovery was still a hope and a plan.