WA's unusual flora and fauna on NatureBase - CALM's website

15/12/98

Western Australia's distinctive native wildlife are now within easy reach of anyone with access to the Internet.

Environment Minister Cheryl Edwardes said today the Department of Conservation and Land Management's (CALM) cyberspace site, NatureBase, now included a new feature - 'Getting to know WA's plants and animals'.

The site included pictures and descriptions of some of the State's unusual flora and fauna as well as a free screensaver.

"'Getting to know WA's plants and animals' presents detailed information on 25 species of birds, wildflowers, mammals, trees and some of the natural oddities," Mrs Edwardes said.

"These pages will be particularly helpful for school student projects focussing on the State's wildlife as well as providing an insight into natural environment for people planning a visit to WA."

Species covered included the white-tailed black cockatoo, common donkey orchid, red and green kangaroo paw, numbat, quokka, jarrah, karri, sheoak and WA Christmas Tree as well as the bilby, echidna and crusader bug.

Mrs Edwardes said NatureBase had become one of WA's major windows on the world wide web.

"The site gets more than 16,000 'hits' a day, of which about half are from overseas," she said.

"The National Parks and Tourism and Recreation pages are the most visited areas on the website, particularly by people interstate and overseas planning to visit WA and we expect that 'Getting to know WA's plants and animals' will become equally as popular."

NatureBase is at http://www.calm.wa.gov.au

'Getting to know WA's plants and animals' can be reached by clicking on the Plants and Animals icon.

NatureBase's Plants and Animals Screen Saver is easy to download. It requires 1.46mb of disc space.

Media contact: Nicole Trigwell 9421 7777