Arthur Mattingley

Arthur Herbert Evelyn Mattingley (1870–1950), noted Australian bird photographer and ornithologist, was a founding member of the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union (RAOU) in 1901. He worked for 40 years with the Commonwealth Customs Department in Melbourne. He also served as President of the RAOU 1913–1914 as well as organising ornithological expeditions to the Bass Strait islands and to central and northern Australia.

He made his greatest impact as a photographer and conservationist when he reported his two visits to the St Helena swamp in the Emu (October 1907)'

A set of the photos and 500 leaflets were sent to Paris, more to Amsterdam and to branches of the Audubon Society in the USA. Groups of uniformed sandwich board men paraded around London, bearing enlargements of the photos.

The photographs contributed to the long-running campaign to eliminate the fashion industry's use of bird feathers. The campaign led to the US 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act and the UK Importation of Plumage (Prohibition) Act 1921 among other prohibitions.

Today, the threat to these birds is not the fashion industry. A report in 2016–2017 noted that 'Large waterbird nesting events have been recorded within Millewa Forest since early in the 20th century (Mattingley, 1907, 1908). Although these breeding events still occur, they are much smaller in size compared to historical events (Maher, 1993) and occur less frequently (Leslie, 2001). This has been attributed largely to removal of water from within the Murray River system.'