With a work career covering much of the eastern seaboard as well as a brief stint in western NSW, Mr Marshall said the workload is highly diverse and often has very strong variations particular to locations where individual rangers are based.

“We do get to spend a lot of time working in the great outdoors and in the Australian bush, but that’s a very overly simplistic impression,” he said.

“Generally rangers have tertiary qualifications in science, which is a good match for a skill set where we are required to learn about and understand the unique biology, ecology, geography and related processes in an area where we work, but also to understand and monitor changes, and then consider and implement adaptive management if needed.

“On the coast, park management is largely about trying to manage people (visitation, tourism, park neighbours, recreation of varying appropriateness, and community expectations), while still protecting the natural and cultural assets of the areas. 

“We do a lot of work to manage visitor facilities like walking tracks, camping areas, park roads, picnic areas, lookouts and other facilities the community generally associate with a National Park setting.

“But in the background, we constantly contrast the impacts of providing these facilities with the need to sustain a viable environment and the conservation of all native species and ecosystems, some of which have very limited distributions, and many of which are almost completely unknown to the general community.

“In all parks, we spend a lot of time dealing with and responding to management of pest species, both weeds and feral animals. 

“This work too, is often compromised by constraints not only because of what can and can’t be done in the natural environment, but also being considerate of the community and the public places we manage.

“This means that the timing and techniques available are often limited to those which minimise impacts on both the natural and cultural values, and also on the safety and convenience of park visitors and the community as well.”

His fascination with the ocean led to a particular interest in the rescue of whales. Most of his experiences is with the rescue of whales or dolphins stranded on beaches, notably the stranding of 52 False Killer Whales at Seal Rocks in 1992, and 13 Melon-headed Whales at Point Plomer in 1996.

He is part of a small number of specialist teams who rescue whales at sea when tangled in various forms of debris and fishing equipment.

“Currently, there are only three teams in NSW trained and equipped to do this potentially hazardous work, and I’m fortunate to have been a member of the Port Macquarie based team since the first rescue we conducted in this area in 2000,” he said.

“The teams from National Parks & Wildlife have effected around 20 rescues of tangled whales which would likely have otherwise died in the debris or equipment from human activities in which they got tangled.”

As a ranger, he works with park visitors and the community to help them appreciate National Parks and special places and creates they manage. He is also passionate about being able to make a difference for the bush and its flora and fauna.

Mr Marshall is, along with one other ranger colleague, responsible for over 25 reserved areas. Each of these areas has a routine annual program for weed and or feral animal control.

“Some reserves have very seasonal pressure from visitors and campers, and we tend to make sure we are rostered on for duty to both help visitors enjoy themselves, but also point them in the right direction when they’re doing things less appropriate in the reserves,” he added.

But there is a downside.

“A lot of the problems we deal with reactively are based around peoples misunderstandings or intolerences of wildlife.

“Wild creatures aren’t hell bent on trying to make our lives difficult or unpleasant or hazardous, for the most part, wild creatures just try to meet their basic needs – food, water, shelter and companionship of varying degrees.

“Not unlike ourselves.

“Wild creatures don’t have any innate sense of our desires or objectives, and so they just simply do what seems to meet their needs at any given point in time.

“A warm cosy roof out of the rain for a possum to find shelter because we removed all the trees big enough to provide them with natural hollows. A feed in the orchard for fruit bats because the forest that would normally meet their needs has been reduced to meet our own landscape and resource needs.

“The thing to change, is people willingness to understand the underlying influences for the behaviours of wildlife, and then find ways to make our worlds and personal spaces less appealing or challenging for the critters before any conflict is required.

“It’s less within my work role to influence, but I would love to see our community have a well-reasoned debate and discussion about population policy in Australia.

“At my end of the scale, is the desire to set aside and responsibly manage sufficient natural areas to accommodate all the species and ecological communities we share this great country with … but the bigger picture is wondering how much more human population we can really accommodate before ecological sustainability is compromised. 

“We can’t simply grow a bigger population without clearing more land for agriculture, or damming more rivers for water supply, or increasing harvest rates in our forests to supply building materials, or clearing land to build more houses, or finding ways to supply energy, or even responsible ways to dispose of our waste.

“The protection of National Parks as something less than 10% of our landscape is not the answer to sustaining human populations in the long term, without also considering where we need to stop the perpetual growth of human populations.”​