Thomas Wernberg, The University of Western Australia and Dan Smale, Marine Biological Association
Western Australia’s marine environment is unique. Two world heritage areas, the largest fringing coral reef in Australia, and more than a thousand kilometres of underwater forests, supporting incredible…
On the western edge of the continent there is a great deal to get the juices flowing.
Carnie Lewis
What is the future of Australia’s wealthiest state? The Conversation, in conjunction with Griffith REVIEW and Curtin University, is publishing a series of articles exploring the unique issues facing Western…
Recent successes inspire hope the Kimberley (and places like it) will eventually be recognised for their deep intrinsic value.
Leah Kennedy/Shutterstock
What is the future of Australia’s wealthiest state? The Conversation, in conjunction with Griffith REVIEW and Curtin University, is publishing a series of articles exploring the unique issues facing Western…
Why are Western Australian artists such as Flynn Talbot, whose work X Y is pictured here, left out of the bigger picture?
Flynn Talbot Studio/Undiscovered Symposium
Despite our interconnectedness through radio, television and the internet, the coverage of arts and cultural activities in Australia is viewed from a very close focus. This corrupts our understanding of…
Shark Bay is one of Australia’s 19 World Heritage Areas, home to dolphins, dugongs, and sharks.
Matthew Fraser
In the summer of 2010-2011 Western Australia experienced an unprecedented heatwave — but not on land. Between December 2010 and April 2011, sea temperatures off the WA coast reached 3C above average, and…
Western Australia has killed two great white sharks after a surfer was seriously injured last week.
Sharkdiver.com/Wikimedia Commons
When I used to tell people that I did my PhD on the politics of shark attacks, they would ask, “Is there a politics to shark attacks?” Nobody asks that any more. Now they just say, “Oh, like in Western…
The shark cull that ran for three months off Perth and the Southwest now looks certain to be ended.
AAP Image/Sea Shepherd
Western Australia’s controversial shark drum line policy will come to an end, after the state’s Environmental Protection Agency recommended that it not be continued this summer. WA EPA chairman Paul Vogel…
Annual show: each spring, thousands of people make the road trip north from Perth to see the wildflowers.
Supplied
Spring has sprung. This time of year is peak wildflower season in the area around Perth, and the display is a major tourism draw card. People flock to places like Lesueur National Park and the Eneabba…
Indigenous groups are concerned about proposed changes to the process for determining heritage sites in Western Australia, including the location of the Nyoongar Tent embassy.
Allen Stewart/Newspix
In June, the Western Australian Government released draft amendments to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 1972. This is the legislation that determines what qualifies for heritage protection in the state – and…
Indigenous land owners weren’t consulted in the past about the creation of Western Australia’s huge Ord River irrigation scheme – but a recent agreement offers a more positive example for developing other parts of northern Australia.
Pete Hill/Flickr
We are very happy to have got this far. We have had our disagreements but we have managed to work through them and now we are all getting on with the job. We have learnt a lot through the process. Standing…
The once-popular Loch McNess north of Perth has dried up almost completely after a decades-long dry period.
ron_n_beth/Flickr
Since 1970, average rainfall in the south-west of Western Australia has decreased by nearly a fifth, and the science suggests that this is linked to human-caused climate change. Across Australia, CSIRO…
Canola fields: one of the battlegrounds of the debate over genetic modification.
Michael Jones/supplied
In a landmark West Australian Supreme Court decision, a farmer growing a genetically modified canola crop has been spared the blame after his neighbour accused him of contaminating his organic farm next…
A 2.6 m tiger shark entangled in a WA drum line. It was officially released alive - whether it survived is another matter.
Neil Henderson/supplied
As Western Australia’s Environmental Protection Authority and the federal environment minister Greg Hunt mull the question of whether to let the state government resume its controversial shark cull next…
The WA government has caught 172 sharks since installing drum lines - but not a single great white.
AAP IMAGE/ SEA SHEPHERD
Perhaps predictably, the Western Australian government has claimed that its shark drum line season, which ended last week, was a success. In a media statement, fisheries minister Ken Baston said that “172…
A section of Robert Dale’s Panoramic View of King George’s Sound.
Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery
Often it is just one artwork that kindles the idea for an exhibition. Robert Dale’s extraordinary panorama of King George Sound, engraved by Robert Havell and published as A Descriptive Account of the…
Factional dealings saw Labor senator Louise Pratt demoted in favour of conservative union heavyweight Joe Bullock in the ALP’s WA Senate ticket.
AAP/Alan Porritt
The only surprising factor in the stories regarding Joe Bullock, who held the number one position on the ALP Senate ticket at Saturday’s Western Australian Senate byelection, was that they took so long…
Has the mining industry drowned out the arts in Western Australia? Not at all – the mines are fertile ground for storytellers.
AAP Image/Rebecca Le May
It is often difficult to ascertain how the location or culture that you live within is perceived by others, but travelling to other parts of Australia or indeed the world as a Western Australian it’s usually…
Big spender: a new report has found workers in the Pilbara have gained the most from the resources boom, but rising costs of living are reducing some of the income gain.
AAP/Will Russell
The mining boom has left the average Western Australian family nearly twice as well off since it began. But skyrocketing prices in some parts of the state have led to a faster escalation of inequality…
Western Australia’s shark kills follow decades of similar policy in Queensland.
AAP Image/Sea Shepherd
One of the most common justifications for Western Australia’s shark cull is the longstanding use of baited hooks - or drum lines - in regions such as Queensland. Two key questions need answering. First…
On the hook: the WA government is targeting white sharks.
Flickr/kqedquest
An unprecedented cluster of white shark bite fatalities in Western Australia over the past decade has led the state government to enact a policy of culling large sharks in coastal waters off Perth and…