Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

Long Swamp, 7 November 2010. Photo by Geoff Park.

Trust for Nature has launched an appeal to protect the Long Swamp wetland which stretches almost 200 ha on the Moolort Plains, east of Maryborough. As the TFN site points out, it was once the jewel in the crown of the Moolort Plains wetland system, the only Deep Freshwater Marsh in the region.

There is currently a unique opportunity to restore the Long Swamp because two of the other three landowners that own land on which Swamp is located have expressed interest in selling. TFN:

This is exciting news – there is an opportunity to permanently protect more than 90% of the wetland. Funding has been sourced from government and philanthropic sources, with a brand-new major donor contributing a substantial sum Trust for Nature is now an estimated 70% of the way to having the funds to purchase and restore this unique and precious wetland. (TFN)

To find out more about the appeal and how to donate, click here.

More information about the Moolort Plains can be found in Geoff Park’s blog where there are many posts about the birdlife and natural features of these wetlands.

Environment Victoria has set up an online assessment system for the three main contenders in the State election. The system, called Promise Watch, can be found here. It offers detailed comment on what the parties have done, and said, about the environment. EV explains the approach as follows:

‘Promise Watch aims to provide factual, spin free, up-to-date information for Victorians about environmental issues and climate change. But it won’t just keep voters informed in the lead-up to the election. By publishing the commitments of the political parties on important issues like coal, renewable energy, sustainable homes and protecting our fragile rivers, we’ll keep doing our job of increasing transparency and holding our elected leaders to account…

‘There are 3 categories:

‘1. Cleaning up our power supply and reducing carbon pollution;
‘2. Making our homes and communities efficient, affordable and sustainable; and
‘3. Protecting and restoring our natural environment.

‘Each week leading up to the election on 29 November, Environment Victoria will update Promise Watch to include any new statements, policies or promises made by the political parties. Because all three major political parties set policy centrally, our Promise Watch focuses on the statements made by key spokespeople, rather than candidates.

‘Before early voting begins on November 17, we’ll release a separate scorecard based on our policy analysis of the commitments each party makes and their track record in the Parliament.’

We’ve received three more brochures telling us what’s in store if we make the ‘right’ decision on election day.

The first is another glossy from the Coalition, with lots of promises under five main headlines. Still no mention of the environment though.

The second is a newsletter from Maree Edwards MP, also glossy, outlining nine major Labor commitments. Also, no mention of the environment. [Labor’s platform can be found here. The section on land management is on pages 83-5.]

More surprisingly, a modest leaflet from the Greens promises to stand up for public schools, trains and buses, new jobs–and integrity. But no mention of the environment. A selection of the Greens’ policies on this can be found here and here.

The major parties all have policies on the environment. The message from their brochure war, however, is that it doesn’t feature as a central concern in this election.

Doug Ralph

We are not quite sure of the exact year FOBIF walks began but it was sometime in the late 1990s. Doug Ralph, one of the founders of FOBIF, initially led all the walks but later other locals shared this task. For many years Margaret Panter helped with organising and promoting the walks’ program. Hundreds of people have come along to these walks exploring and learning to appreciate our local Box-Ironbark forests. As well many people on the walks including Frances Cincotta, Margaret Panter and Noel Young have shared their in-depth knowledge of local plants.

We have always kept the same format: 8 walks a year from March to October on the third Sunday of the month. As usual this year we had an interesting variety of destinations: Forest Creek (Marie Jones), Poverty Gully and Eureka Reef (Marian Letcher), Mount Alexander (Doug Ralph), Kalimna Park (Julian Hollis), Muckleford Gorge (Deirdre Slattery), Fryers Ranges (Richard Piesse), Muckleford Forest (Neville Cooper) and Fryers Ridge (Alex Panelli). A big thanks to all those leaders.

This year we have expanded the walks program. Naomi Raftery who joined the FOBIF Committee this year organised 2 family walks, an autumn one in Kalimna Park and a spring one in Kaweka Sanctuary. If you would like to see children exploring nature have a look at this slide show below. (Click anywhere on the image to start.)

Young FOBIF member Nioka Mellick-Copper organised two teenage walks, also in spring and autumn. The first was in Muckleford and the second on the Eureka Reef interpretive trail. These two walks were supported through a Mount Alexander Shire Youth Grant. More on these walks can be viewed here and here.

Teenagers with their parents on the Spring bush walk.

Due to March and September often being hot we have decided to have shorter walks in these months. The first 2015 walk of approximately 4 km will take place on 15 March in the Rise and Shine Bush Reserve. This walk will be led by Geoff Park. The full program for next year’s walks (adult, teenage and family) will be available early next year.

Election brochures are starting to appear in letter boxes and we’ll be taking a brief look at the ones that come our  way.  First up is the Liberal-National Coalition: we have three of their brochures directed at Bendigo region electors.

The first, under the names of Premier Napthine and MPs Wendy Lovell and Amanda Millar, lists six categories for ‘building a better Bendigo region’: roads, communities, healthcare, schools, public transport, and crime.

The second, from Damian Drum, MP, lists 30 ‘key initiatives’ and 42 ‘further key investments.’

And the third, from Bendigo West candidate Michael Langdon, lists ‘five big plans for Bendigo.’

Not one of them mentions the environment, although this features in recent polls as more important to electors than two of the ones they do promote prominently– roads and law and order. No mention of water, either; or agriculture. Their absence suggests where these issues rest in the government’s priorities.

Brochures: if these are any indication, the Coalition isn’t very interested in the environment.

To be fair, you can’t judge a government by its brochures…for a comprehensive list of the Coalition’s claims on the environment, click here . The list has to be judged on its merits, though we can’t resist pointing out that it omits mention of private development, cattle grazing and prospecting in National Parks. It also seems to assume that abolition of the 20% renewable energy target, burning a record area of public land and making it easier to clear native vegetation are wins for the environment.  We are a long distance from the time of Bill Borthwick, Victoria’s first and probably greatest Conservation Minister, who served under Premiers Bolte, Hamer and Thompson, and founded the EPA and the Land Conservation Council.

For a detailed assessment of the Coalition’s enviro record by Environment Victoria, click here. 

Next up: Labour and Greens brochures, if we get any.

Recent polls have found that 81% of Victorian voters support more funding for the protection of nature, 57% oppose private developments in National Parks, and the environment is a bigger issue of concern than law-and-order and roads.

There are polls and polls, of course, but these findings look pretty reasonable from here. In any case, FOBIF believes that candidates in the upcoming election should be put on the spot about what they think about issues to do with the management of nature. We’ve circulated to members a list of questions it might be worth putting to candidates nominated so far. We hope lots of people will take the opportunity to ask the questions–and that they make it clear they don’t want pre packaged party responses. Let’s find out whether the candidates really have thought about the issues [and have serious convictions about them], or whether they’re just regurgitating the Party line.

Here are some questions we think are worth a run:

1. In 2012-13 the State Government embarked on a program of cutting 10% of Parks Victoria’s staff, continuing a process of cuts begun under the previous government. Do you support these cuts? Can you tell me how many Park Rangers are looking after parks in the Bendigo region? Do you think MPs would be more efficient if their funding was cut by 10%?

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