Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

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In a recent article, the Victorian National Parks Association has this to say about the deer population explosion in Victoria:

Deer have become Victoria’s cane toads. With a population of around 1 million deer in the state, and probably growing by 400,000 a year, they are now poised to take over the nation.

Six species of deer are already seriously trashing our national parks and conservation reserves such as the Grampians, Alpine, Mount Buffalo, Mitchell River and Croajingolong national parks, as well as rainforest valleys and other threatened ecosystems throughout the state. They’re invading farms and front gardens, and a clear danger on our roads.

FOBIF has previously commented on the deer population in our region.

The Victorian Government has developed a Draft Deer Management Strategy  As the VNPA has pointed out, this Strategy has been heavily influenced by a deer hunting fraternity keen to protect deer populations as a recreational resource. They are encouraging people to respond to the Strategy:

The government, and our land management agencies, aren’t responding with the urgency this situation requires.

They may not act strongly enough if they don’t hear from you by next Monday 29 October.

You can help by filling in a few boxes in the online survey on the draft strategy website (it will only take a few minutes): engage.vic.gov.au/draft-victorian-deer-management-strategy

You can download the VNPA’s Deer Issues Paper here. FOBIF will be responding to the Strategy and we encourage others to do so by Monday 29 October. 

The Allure of Fungi by Alison Pouliot has recently been published by the CSIRO.  

Alison’s press release:

“Although relatively little known, fungi provide the links between the terrestrial organisms and ecosystems that underpin our functioning planet.

A few weeks ago we included a post on The Victorian Environment Assessment Council draft report on its Central West Investigation.

The report recommended that a significant part of the Wombat forest be included in a new Wombat-Lerderderg National Park. A further recommendation was that the western part of the Wellsford State Forest be absorbed into the Bendigo Regional Park, and the eastern and northern section of the forest be created as a nature reserve. The main impact of these latter changes would be the protection of the Wellsford from logging. Readers will remember that Vicforests was proposing renewed logging in this magnificent box ironbark area.

Although the report does not directly cover the Mount Alexander shire we think that it is important for as many people as possible to forward written submissions supporting the positive features of the report.

The closing date for submissions has been extended from 31 October to Monday 10 December.

It’s spring! Wildflowers are a bit slow to emerge this year, but there are signs–plenty of orchids, for example. And we can always hope, though it’s been dry, and doesn’t look like it’s going to improve. Here’s the Bureau of Meteorology predictions on the chances of above average rainfall to November:

The recent VEAC Central West report puts it this way: ‘As with most of Victoria, the Central West Investigation area has already experienced some effects of climate change. For example, since the 1950s average annual rainfall in the investigation area has declined by 100 to 200 millimetres and average temperatures have increased by approximately 1.2 to 1.4 degrees. These trends are projected to continue with more hot days, increased fire weather and more frequent extreme weather events.’