The ant pictured below is a member of the genus Rhytidoponera. The curious thing about it is that the creature is labouring to carry a shoot of moss [Pseudocrossidium crinitum].
Ant behaving strangely, Kalimna Park, February 2013
As far as we know, ants feed on other invertebrates and forage for such matter as honey. Moss somehow doesn’t fit the bill. The specimen above lugged its burden over difficult terrain for about a metre, then abandoned it. Any clues about this behaviour are welcome.
FOBIF has produced a weed map of the south western corner of Kalimna Park. This section of about 24 ha—essentially the area from Kalimna Point to the golf course— is currently scheduled as a DSE Zone 1 asset protection burn [CAS 003], possibly this Autumn. We’ve been advised that DSE plans to treat the area closest to the town [heavily infested by gorse] by slashing.
The weed maps can be seen in our Documents section.
From our point of view, one of the interesting results of the survey is the confirmation that the areas along the Kalimna tourist road, and north east of the town water tank, are relatively weed free—as well as being floristically very interesting. DSE officers have been sympathetic to representations from residents concerned about the special qualities of this area.
The southern section of the block has a colony of Eltham Copper butterflies.
Section of Kalimna Park in the CAS 003 burn area. DSE is proposing to slash the section closest to the town.
FOBIF accepts that there’s a fuel management challenge in the Park, because of its proximity to the town boundary at Fletcher Street. The area of CAS 003 is small by the standards of DSE burns: but it may be that the challenge would best be met [from the point of view of reducing fuel while getting a good ecological result] by breaking the parcel into even smaller sections, and treating each according to its particular qualities.
The photo below could be duplicated hundreds of times through our region: a tree sitting on a ‘pedestal’on the edge of a deeply eroded gully. When that tree was young, it was at ground level. So, where has all the soil gone?
Tree 'pedestal', German Gully: once this tree stood at ground level. Annual soil loss in most of Australia is estimated at one tonne per hectare, twice the rate at which it can be replaced by organic decomposition.
The obvious answer is, it’s been washed away downstream, eventually ending up in the Loddon, as a result first of nineteenth century mining works, and afterwards of a long process of erosion. Here’s a report from the Mount Alexander Mail, August 27 1854:
‘The water in the Loddon was higher last week than it has been all the season. The puddling and sluicing on the banks of the stream have converted its once clear current into as muddy a state as many of its tributaries. It is said that the fish that were occasionally washed down Fryers Creek sunk to the bottom, as though suddenly deprived of motion, on reaching the earth-laden waters of the Loddon. Just now it is questionable whether any of the finny tribe can be found near the Junction.’
Almost all of our eroded gullies show a dual process: relentless erosion, and painfully slow build up of vegetation cover counteracting that erosion. In theory, land management policy encourages the second process to stop the first.
The State Government has directed the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council to nominate areas in six National and State Parks where recreational prospecting will be allowed. Details of the brief are here.
FOBIF has made a submission to VEAC, which reads partly as follows:
It is hard to believe that VEAC has been given such a brief without prior authority to investigate first the question, ‘should any additional areas be made available for recreational prospecting in our National and State Parks.’
Prospecting site, Castlemaine Diggings NHP: there appears to be no monitoring of prospecting in the Park. Ranger resources are too limited for any effective supervision, and there seems no way of controlling rogue prospectors.
Prospecting has been permitted in the Castlemaine Diggings National Heritage Park for about ten years. The Park’s Management Plan [2005-7] specifies that management ‘monitor the impacts of prospecting on cultural and natural values of the park’ and work with relevant groups to address the causes.’ [page 42]
It would seem logical that no decision about additional areas for prospecting should be made without first checking on the experience with the practice in this park.
What is the status of the monitoring of prospecting in the Castlemaine Diggings NHP? What conclusions can be drawn from it about potentially damaging practices?
One of Alison Pouliot's fungi images
Fungi expert, Alison Pouliot, has returned to Australia and will be offering ‘a series of seminars, workshops, forays and feasts’ in April and May. Most are reasonably close to Castlemaine – Glenlyon, Woodend, Trentham and Creswick.
So if you’re interested in finding out more about this curious kingdom, have a look at her 2013 program.
The objections by FOBIF and some local residents to current proposals to build a housing development at Diamond Gully were rejected at the Victorian Administrative Appeals Tribunal in December.
The VCAT decision was reported in detail in the Midland Express [December 11]. FOBIF made a submission, but was not represented at the appeal hearing, and the panel’s findings did not refer to our grounds of objection. These were, in substance, to do with fire and forest health.
It’s worth repeating that FOBIF has consistently made plain that we have no objection to a housing development in this area—consistent with protection of high quality bushland, and avoidance of high fire risk placement of housing.
Bushland near Castlemaine: evidence submitted to the Royal Commission showed that houses closer than 50 metres from the bush stood a 50-60% chance of being destroyed under extreme bushfire conditions.
Our submission read, in part:
‘The CFA had previously made an assessment of an adjoining subdivision west of this proposal [Friends of the Iron Bark Forests v Mt Alexander Shire [2011] VCAT 2181 (22 November 2011)]. The CFA assessed the vegetation here as being “Medium Forest” and hence requiring a defendable space of 50 or 60 meter…
‘With this proposal the surrounding forest to the west and the south is the same forest block as for the adjoining subdivision but here the CFA has required a defendable space of 30 meter …The defendable space for this subdivision needs to be at least 50 meter as it was for the adjoining subdivision.’
On this subject, the following comment on fire danger to housing by Macquarie University researchers is worth quoting:
‘The single variable that explains most of the vulnerability of a home to bushfire is its distance from the bush. Research conducted by Professor John McAneney and Dr Keping Chen in 2004 and 2010 mapped the location of houses destroyed in some major historical fires and their distance to the nearest bushland interface.
The Poverty Gully management burn [CAS 008] was a Zone 1 fuel reduction exercise covering 99.6 hectares on the Castlemaine town side of the Dingo Park road, north of Poverty Gully Track. It was conducted late last year.
The Arthur’s Track burn [CAS 107] is a Zone 2 exercise covering 243 ha on the south side of the Poverty Gully Track. The two burns, CAS 008 and 107, are contiguous, but the Arthur’s Track exercise has been broken up: an area was done in November, and we assume the rest will be finished in Autumn. This is to take account of the presence in this zone of Castlemaine Spider Orchids, and Eltham Copper Butterfly colonies.
Fire fungus growing in the ash of the Poverty Gully fuel reduction burn. Zone 1 Asset protection burns are for fuel reduction only, but it's worth asking if the safety effect could be achieved with less environmental damage.
The purpose of Zone 1 reduction burns is fuel reduction to ‘provide the highest level of localised protection to human life and property.’ According to DSE’s Code of Practice fuel treatment ‘will be carried out through a combination of planned burning and other methods such as mowing, slashing or vegetation removal.’ The aim of the operation is to remove or substantially reduce surface and suspended fuels: in effect, we’re told, a burn aims to cover 90 % of the parcel in question.
There is no provision for ecological management in Zone 1 prescriptions, and DSE officers have frankly admitted that these are sacrificial zones, ecologically speaking. In particular, it’s envisaged that these areas can be burned every five years: the Tolerable Fire Interval for bushland in our region is at least ten years: that is, for bush to be able to regenerate fully it needs at least ten years between even mild fires. The system, therefore, must inevitably produce an impoverished environment. The only concession is that the Code of Practice directs that ‘the department will seek to moderate the negative impact as far as practicable.’ This is the price the community pays for safety.
Here are some impressions of the Poverty Gully burns. We’ve divided them into six sections, and would be interested in any further member comments. We’ve made no effort to assess the burns’ success in reducing fuel.
The interdepartmental shemozzle problem
A comical touch?—the polythene sheeting put into the water race by Coliban Water a few years ago to prevent leakage was melted and burned to a black ash or slime. There’s a slight element of madness here: as this review is being written [January 31] water is flowing through the channel from Malmsbury. This channel is
Poverty Gully channel, February 5: Most of the sheeting put in by Coliban Water to reduce leakage from the channel was destroyed by the reduction burn--not a great advertisement for inter departmental consultation.
notoriously leaky, and it’s been suggested that it should be taken out of commission—but if water is going to be brought through it, it might as well be done as efficiently as possible. It’s not great that one Government body is burning down the work of another. DSE is bound by its protocols to consult with other relevant managers before conducting its burns, but we believe Coliban Water wasn’t consulted on this one.
The large tree problem
Large old trees are not a fuel hazard targeted by reduction burns, but FOBIF has found that it’s common for DSE fires to destroy these trees. This is a big loss to biodiversity with no gain for safety, and over the years we’ve puzzled over why it inevitably happens. Among possible answers: the managers on the ground don’t really know or care about ecology [true of a minority of DSE managers]; lack of knowledge of the burn parcel as to where valuable tree assets are [with increasingly large burn parcels, this is quite likely]; and lack of resources to identify and exclude valuable trees in the burn zone [the most likely explanation].
When compared to recent DSE ‘fuel reduction’ operations, like Ashby’s Track in North Castlemaine [an out and out artificial bushfire] and Tarilta Gorge [a travesty of an ‘ecological’ burn], CAS 008 and 107 are greatly superior jobs. Relatively few
A public meeting to get community ideas on the flood problem in our local creeks will be held on Monday February 18 at 6.30 pm at the Castlemaine Town Hall.
The meeting is being held by the Catchment Management Authority, the Shire Council and GHD, a firm of water industry experts. It’s part of the process of developing a flood management plan for Castlemaine, Campbell’s Creek and Chewton. The process has been funded by the State Government in response to recent flood events.
Readers will remember that there was some controversy during recent floods about whether vegetation along creeks increases water levels. Our posts on this can be found here and here.
Damian Kelly has contributed this article on birds in his Castlemaine garden. To see previous posts by Damian on garden birds, click here and here.
This summer has seen a much reduced number and range of birds in my garden in Castlemaine. Honeyeater numbers in particular are well down. However, by providing water we still get a reasonable variety of birds in the garden.
The Blue-faced Honeyeater seems to be getting more common in this area. A small number have been resident in Castlemaine continuously since at least early Autumn. They can be seen along the street trees in Mostyn and Lyttleton streets, as well as in gardens in this area. They have a distinctive call.
Blue-faced Honeyeater
Another less regular visitor is the White-eared Honeyeater. It has a strident call that can be heard long before you see the bird. Although not common around town, you will see them if you add water bowls in protected spots in your garden.
White-eared Honeyeater
I like watching the Yellow-faced Honeyeaters – they are quite curious and you can often get up close to them. This one is having a good preen after bathing in a water bowl on a hot day.
Yellow-faced Honeyeaters
To me, the Eastern Spinebill is one of the most appealing of the honeyeaters – it can hover to get at flowers and is partial to a range of natives as well as introduced plants. Quite a sight when you get to see views like this.
Eastern Spinebill
Although not often seen in gardens, Woodswallows are often to be seen in groups in the sky hawking for insects. They have a soft, chattering call that comes from on high. Here is a male and female White-browed Woodswallow pair.
Woodswallows
White Everlasting Daisy (Chrysocephalum baxteri)
Slime Mould
Dunns Reef
Tall Greenhoods
Gnat Orchid
Blue Caladenia
Downy Grevillea (Grevillea alpina)
Coliban river upstream of the Gibbons bridge
Coliban river upstream of the Gibbons bridge.
Coliban river upstream of the Gibbons bridge.
Sailors Gully ruin
Loddon River near Vaughan
Cortinarius archeri
Mycena subgalericulata
Cortinarius rotundisporus
Cortinarius cystidiocatenatus,
Ramaria sp.
Pink Heath
Mount Alexander
Mount Alexander
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Click on image for info/order page