People were very positive in relation to this petition calling for the rebuilding of the Tathra Wharf Ring Road with a total number of more than 1500 signatures. Copies of this petition have also been given to Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly and Bega Valley Shire Mayor Kristy McBain.

Bega Valley Shire Council is committed to defending and protecting our pristine environment ... well, some of the time and depending on who you are, of course.

If you want to throw rubbish from your car, including cigarette butts, council quite rightly labels you as a "tosser" ... an irresponsible, anti-social loser who cares little for our environment. If you are caught, you can expect a fine anywhere between $250 to $500 as your reward. If you refuse to pay council tip fees and decide to dump your old mattress, white goods, car parts or green waste in the bush, your reward might be even more significant: up to $8000, depending on the scale of your offence.

If you are a developer, you can pretty-well write your own rules in the Bega Valley.

There have been two significant spills of sediment into the Merimbula Back Lake from a subdivision being developed in Mirador. In response to its inquiries relating to the first incident in February of this year, BVSC advised the BVSRRA that remedial action had been taken at the direction of council and that it did not intend to impose a penalty on the developer.

On April 1, the BVSRRA again wrote to council referring to a further significant incursion of sediment into the lake from the same development, asking council what steps it intended to take to impose a penalty and what were the findings of the environmental consultant who had been requested to assess the damage to the lake's ecosystem.

What penalty does the community think is reasonable in response to two separate incidents where tons of sediment have been allowed to flow from a development site into a pristine lake, contrary to council's environmental controls?

In the developer friendly world operated by BVSC, the cost for polluting our environment is absolutely nothing.

And apart from Cr Nadin, who at least attempted to pursue the issue at the last meeting of council, not a word of concern was voiced by our inept and ignorant council in response to this latest act of environmental vandalism.

The BVSRRA has to acknowledge that at times it struggles to find the right words to characterise council's behaviour.

Regarding the Narooma Oyster Festival's contest for Australia's biggest oyster, the oyster shown is a Pacific oyster, not a native Sydney rock oyster.

The Pacific or Japanese oyster will always outgrow the Sydney Rock and for decades was declared a noxious fish by the Department of Primary Industries.

It was the oyster farmer's responsibility to destroy any found on his or her cultivation, and still is in most NSW rivers. We throw any Pacifics we find in the rubbish bin. They are an introduced species.

Fortunately for Narooma, when two-to-three growers tried to get departmental approval to grow them a few years ago, local farmers overwhelmingly rejected them.

Remember: big is not always best.

The Sydney rock is a far superior oyster. It is one of only a few native oysters left in the world; 80 per cent of oysters consumed are Pacifics, mainly because of loss of native species due primarily to over fishing and water quality issues.

Please, before you think all oysters are generic and oysters are oysters, they are not.