Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

A solid group of FOBIF walkers led by Richard Piesse dropped in to the Tarilta Valley from Porcupine Ridge on Sunday in brisk but fine winter weather. There was good bird watching and plenty of fungi on show, and the valley is showing fair but patchy recovery from DSE’s disastrous 2012 fire exercise.

Taking a break by the Tarilta Creek.

The group left the valley via the impressive rock cleft and waterfall ridge [which, unfortunately, rarely sees much water – see first photo below], and wound its way through an isolated subsidiary valley to the Great Dividing Trail.

Click on photos below to enlarge. Photographers are Bernard Slattery and Noel Young.

Noel Young sent us the following observations:

The bird life was fairly active in the area, and I was able to identify the following either by site or call:
Thornbill flocks, White throated Treecreeper, Golden Whistler, White eared Honeyeater, Grey Shrike-thrush, Spotted Pardalote, Long billed Corella, Sulphur crested Cockatoo, Crimson Rosella and Horsfield’s Bronze Cuckoo. 

 Two Black Wallabies crossed the Porcupine ridge road on the way in.

 I didn’t attempt a plant list, but there were several species of wattle flowering, including an unusually common occurrence of A gunni. (Ploughshare), a number of flowering Sundews, and an occasional Hovea and white or pink heath flowers. No flowering orchids were found as far as I know.

Following its objections to roadworks scalping valuable vegetation from the Fryers Ridge, FOBIF has written to the Environment Minister asking for clarification of policy on vegetation management of roadsides.

The letter reads, in part:

“Forest managers have told us that, though this method of vegetation management is not ‘ideal’, budgetary restraints prevent them from using more labour intensive methods—like selective removal of obstructive vegetation, or moderate grooming. Further, there seems to be a common assumption in the Department that ‘priority to safety’ means absolute disregard for environmental values, when it should mean: careful management of vegetation to maintain sight lines and encourage sensible driver behaviour.

Fryers Ridge, July 2015: the road is the strip in the background. Managers plead that budget restrictions mean that ‘scalping’–scouring the earth–is the only option they have in managing roadside vegetation.

“Our group is fully aware of the necessity to maintain proper fire access roads, and to manage adjacent vegetation to minimise the likelihood of accidents. We believe, however, that this should be done with minimum of disturbance to  environmental values. We assume that Victoria adheres to the common principle ‘avoid, minimise, mitigate and lastly offset’ in its road management policy?

“Given that managers often justify crude practices by appealing to budget limitations, we have four questions:

1. What is the Department’s [and the Government’s] policy on roadside scalping?
2. What is the Department’s 2015-6 budget for a. Forest management and b. conservation reserve management, compared to the same figures of 2005-6?
3. Do the native vegetation clearance regulations which have been the subject of recent community consultation apply to the Department’s own managers?
4. Is there any monitoring of the effects of roadside clearing on the environment?”

As this post is being written, controversy sputters over the destruction of 900 ancient river red gums as part of improvements to the Western Highway: seemingly another exercise by government in which ‘safety’–or in this case, speed–sweeps aside any other considerations.

Julie Whitfield of Bendigo is an environmental consultant with a passion for butterflies, and she will be guest speaker at Newstead Landcare’s next meeting, Thursday 20^th August.

As a recipient of a prestigious Winston Churchill Fellowship Julie recently had the pleasure of exploring conservation projects for butterflies in the USA and the UK with the dream of bringing these models back to Victoria to apply with our local groups.

Julie will provide a presentation on these experiences and on the butterfly species likely to occur in the Newstead area, and their role in local ecosystems.

Mount Alexander Shire has a few populations of the extremely rare Eltham Copper Butterfly which has an extraordinary relationship with a particular ant species and Sweet Bursaria shrubs. Julie will introduce you to this marvel as well as to some of our more common local butterflies.

All are welcome to attend the talk on Thursday 20^th August at 8 pm at Newstead Community Centre (gold coin donations appreciated). No need to book in – just come along, discover and be inspired!

Julie Whitfield in action

A bitterly cold morning didn’t deter FOBIF walkers from tackling some obscure corners of the Columbine and Salters Creeks valleys on Sunday. The corners turned out to be even more obscure than intended when a navigation error by walk leader Bernard Slattery landed the group in an unexpected approach to Salters Creek. Well, as the great Paddy Pallin might have said, in this country you’re ‘never quite lost’, and we all emerged triumphant and on time.

The walk included a look at one of Doug Ralph’s favourite haunts: Charlie Sanger’s hut, near Columbine Creek. As usual, we provided perfect winter weather for the occasion.

Lunch at Salters Creek

Walkers at Sanger’s hut site. Photo by Noel Young

Bernard addressing the group at Sanger’s hut site.