Well, this dry it has been challenging to keep our plantings from drying out. Our latest planting on the creek bank and what the Green Army did late last year and early this year is mostly doing all right.

A picnic table is on its way

Greg made a suggestion last year that we have a picnic table near the creek in the area under the mature trees. Brooke Lett of Galvin Road has offered to build our picnic table. 

Things to do

We have four more working bees this year and a couple next year before the threat of heavy rain events and flooding. The area near the culvert needs to be protected with plants and rocks. 

While we can never be sure what damage the flooding will have and on each occasion we lose plants and creek bank. However some bank and plants remain and so we repair and over time we will stabilize the bank with native vegetation instead of been overgrown with exotic grasses and vines. This is what we have been doing on our creek bank for the past number of years, So this is why we have been concentrating on this area. 

In addition, we need to keep the elephant grass out of the main creek channel and keep the access to the creek open. This allows regrowth and regeneration of native plants which in time will replace the exotic weeds.  I am hoping we can also keep open secondary channels by slashing along side these. We have started to do this with one from the far culvert running alongside the area of the mature trees to the main channel. 

During the dry spell the planting has been managed by regular watering and suppression of weed growth around these plants. This is the hard part of any bush regeneration project. Often the easier part is the clearing and planting. Not saying that it doesn’t involve effort but follow up is the harder part as it involves commitment to realise the hard gains we are making. 

What is encouraging is seeing the gains! Plants we have planted, some are starting to flower and produce seeds. A few of the lomandras, the yellow Senna on the road side have lovely seed pods. A number of existing plants like the deep yellow wood, green and yellow kamala, mutton wood, red olive plum and a number of vines like the slender lilly, barb wire vine are producing seeds and have provide new plants that regrow in this area. Like also the kangaroo vine which is dropping black fruits on the road margin just opposite Galvin Road. 

The mature gray gums, brush box and iron barks rain down seeds or bring in birds and other wildlife that shed seeds for re-growth. The under story plants are starting to thrive like the native grasses and ferns such as the rasp and maiden hair ferns. The re-growth of these plants is made easier when they are not overgrown by exotic grasses and vines that have been in the area for some time. 

The two areas special in this site is the area under the mature eucalyptus and the area under the canopy where the cats claw is growing (but being managed). Both areas have great abundance and increase biodiversity of native plants  
Finally, be on the look out in the coming few months for yellow flowers up trees, Cats Caw Creeper. 

Lets break the cycle and stop the spread of seeds!

Wildlife sightings