Revegetation takes to the water - an experiment in reducing erosion

250 sedges planted along the riverbank

Great working bee today!

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We had a wonderful working bee today. Thank you to everyone who came along to plant trees. 

We were also treated to a wonderful French themed surprise prepared by Cecile. A tradition for starting the New Year with an epiphany. Each if us took a piece of la-galette-des-rois.and our king and queen of the corridor were crowned..., based on  finding small ceramic figures in the delicious French dessert! 

We planted about 90 trees. 😄

Today was a bit different to other days because we started in the afternoon. It was lovely being down by the river in the afternoon.

Hamish found a nest of baby birds! Well done Hamish! 

December working bee - tree planting and cats claw tuber collection

Another 70 trees were planted and about 150 plus Cats Claw tubers were collected at our working bee today. We also protected a number of trees with tree guards. The she oaks in particular have been very popular food for some of the local critters and many have been eaten off.

Well done everyone for persisting in the hot conditions!

Potting up Cats claw tubers to feed the biological controls - jewel beetles and tingids

Sand paper fig that has established itself since cattle have been removed from this part of the corridor.

Maintenance on trees in the corridor - a mixture of methods are being used.

Plantings under adverse conditions

Planting over the winter has been minimised because of the frost possibility and eventually a few frosts occurred late in the very warm winter but little damage was done to seedlings. Grazing damage by animals, probably hares is a problem though.

Some of our winter plantings in the corridor

 Because of the dry conditions in spring no normal plantings have been possible but we have experimented with strengthing the riparian vegetation by planting near the waters edge in areas of moist soil from seepage - which are often found below a bank slump as seepage is often associated with slumps. This planting was carried out from a dinghy. Species planted were Lomandra Longiflolia, Melaleuca Viminalis ( Weeping Bottlebrush), Casuarina Cunninghamiana (River She-oak) , Melaleuca Bracteata (Black Tea-tree) and a few Waterhousea Floribunda.

Ross and Terry, our regular volunteer, ready to start planting

A small slump with some Lomandra planted at the toe of the bank

One of our hopeful planted seedlings in the foreground but notice the number of naturally occurring ti tree seedlings above which have established in the hard clay

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The value of Lomandra - the tuft in the mid top is still alive atop of an eroded root column about 500mm above the ground surface. It has withstood many floods and is still hanging on!

 Some pictures of the working bee held by GMA members on Sunday 7th July to clear the debris from one of the landholders riparian fence which had been damaged and covered with lots of sticks, grass and other rubbish. This will allow new plantings to take place on river to enhance the koala corridor.

A pedestrian crossing the Koala Corridor

Some of the team in action

Some damage to the river bank

 (with an infestation of cat's claw in the background)

Piles of debris like this were common in this area

Restanding a washed out fence post

Treating a "mature" Cat's Claw infestation on the Koala Corridor

One of the landholders on the Koala Corridor has an advanced infestation of Cat's Claw Creeper and while they are not prepared at this stage to increase their riparian fencing area they have allowed us to treat the infestation of CCC. These photos show just how massive cat's claw vines can get, unfortunately we can't get any images of the damage they are doing in the canopy.

I am sure these trees are very grateful for the Federal DAFF  and BMRG funding which make the Cat's Claw control efforts of GMA much more effective.

A bare sandy area covered with Cat's Claw pods from above

A small native tree with four cats claw vines climbing up it and it was still alive ! (Felt marker for scale)

 

A treated CCC stump

Some more vines treated by our contractor

More trees planted and tubers potted up

Another 60 trees were planted today. Lots of blue gums and some narrow leafed iron bark.
That brings our total number of trees planted to more than 400!