Few whose livelihood doesn't depend on tree-felling like to see gums chopped down that were giants before Captain Cook arrived.

Only vested interests want wholesale land clearing to farm more cloven-hoofed animals that do little for soil ecology.

Most of us would like to see water-guzzling farming trends like rice-growing in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area sent packing north so our rivers can stop being drained of

their lifeblood for irrigation, when these inland arteries are flowing, of course.

And most folk are aware that the continued degradation of our planet will have vast consequences, probably sooner rather than later, if all nations can't agree on a way to stop our greenhouse gas emissions.

There are plenty who'd love to ride to work on a pushbike, but for most of us, it's dangerous, arduous and impractical.

Ditto, catching a train instead of singly occupying the family chariot... ah, if only there was a railway through the Hills.

Individually, we do our best for the environment in many small ways, like limiting our use of precious aqua, composting, binning non-biodegradable rubbish, and so on.

It may only be tokenism, but every little bit helps.

Which is why I can't understand so many of my fellow fishos. Fishermen whinge like crazy about the increasing number of marine parks foisted on them along the eastern seaboard by ''those bloody loopy Greens.'' But they certainly don't help their own cause.

Just look at where land-based fishos operate.

You can always tell their hot spots; that's where all the litter lies.

A fisherman's paradise, as I found to my deep shame up north over Christmas, is often a garbage heap.

Discarded drink bottles and cans, food wrappers, cigarette packets, butts galore and leftover bait festering in plastic, not to mention fish hooks and other tackle.

Slip between a rock and you've every chance of getting badly cut with a broken beer bottle, as I've done twice.

Diana Simmons of Paddington wrote in the The Sydney Morning Herald recently: ''I reckon the

majority of fishers are selfish louts and deserve no sympathy.''

It shames me to say so, but it's hard to disagree.