Friday, April 30, 2010

Capacity Building Activities for 2010

We have just revised our calendar for capacity building activities for the year. Please note the following new dates and locations :

  • Birds on farms workshop - Yambuk (Friday 11th June)
  • Wetlands Workshop - Caramut (Friday 13th August)
  • Direct Seeding Demonstration - Orford (Friday 8th October)
  • Coastal Weed & Identification workshop - Warrnambool (Friday 15th October)
  • Healing the Soil with Native Pastures - Location to be announced (Friday 22nd October).

Flyers will be sent out approximately 4-6 weeks prior to all events. If yoy are interested in attending, please contact myself Richard Hudson on 0458 268 119 or email richardb2b@gmail.com .

Thursday, April 29, 2010

AGM and Recruitment Drive a Great Success

Last night Basalt to Bay held it's annual AGM/recruitment drive in Port Fairy. A nice crowd of 21 people turned out and from that we gained a few more volunteers for local Landcare groups.

It was a great night, with a fantastic meal from head chef, Dianne from the HUB in Port Fairy and presentations by Peter Forster from the Environmental Farmes Network and Inka Veltheim from the SW Brolga Research Project.

Folks enjoyed some serious networking and we all enjoyed the talk by Peter and Inka. We were all much the wiser about the benefits of gaining carbon credits from biodiversity planting and the benfits that landholders gain from improving local biodiversity and shelter for stock and crops. We also learned that the southern Brolga currently faces endangered status in Victoria and that key threats to it's ongoing survival include fox predation, disturbance from Wind Farms and clearing of habitat by landholders.

Thanks to the Department of Planning and Community Development and Glenelg Hopkins CMA for sponsoring the night.

Saving the Amazing Brolgas

Inka Veltheim is a PhD student currently studying southern Brolga distribution and migration at the University of Ballarat.

Inka spoke last night at Basalt to Bay Landcare Networks AGM. During her talk, Inka highlighted that the sothern Brolga population currently has an threatened status, with only some 750 birds, with many of these birds located at 4 major sites. This is in stark contrast to the northern population of Brolgas, who are thought to number between 75,000-100,000. The southern Brolga has an ageing population with only 3 % of flocks being immature birds. Inka confirmed that unless significant steps are taken to mitigate ongoing losses, the Brolga may reach a tipping point, beyond which they may not recover.

Inka said that current threats to the Brolga include the Red Fox, disturbance from wind farms and powerlines and a loss of wetland habitat due to clearing and over grazing by land holders. It is thought that threats can be mitigated by :
  • Culling of Red Foxes
  • Identifying how much space is required by Brolgas, so that disturbance by windfarms is reduced
  • The creation of large scale artificial wetlands with diverse wetland flora
  • The protection of known flocking and nesting sites, using barbless wire
  • Creation of large buffer zones around wetlands - the larger the better
  • Creating wetlands between grain crops
  • Reducing the presence of Powerlines near known Brolga flocking and nesting sites.
Inka also suggested that the Brolga is an ideal indicator species for the overall health of wetlands. As the presence of Brolgas usually indicates high levels of general biodiversity and wetland bird biodiversity.

Brolgas are found across the south west of Victoria from Corangamite to Mount Gambier. The most significant populations are found in Penshurst and Willaura but birds have also been recorded across in areas such as Portalnd, Warrnambool, Mt Richmiond, Kaladbro and Glenthompson.

Inka would like to hear from anyone in the south west of Victoria who has seen any Brolgas or any landholder who knows of any Brolga sites or has any knowldge about the history of local Brolgas.

You can contact Inka by email on inka_veltheim@yahoo.com.au or you can call her on 03 9877 5342. You can read about her project here : http://victorianbrolgastudy.com.au/

Further information on Brolgas can be found here :
  • http://bird.net.au/bird/index.php?title=Surveys
  • http://ozcranes.net/index.html
  • http://ozcranes.net/research/proj.html#brol
  • http://www.boca.org.au/
  • http://www.savingcranes.org/brolga.html
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brolga .

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Warrnambool Coastcare Landcare Group Update for April

Hi Guys,

Now that we have recovered from the Lava Flows bus trip (which was a fantastic day) here is a few more activities happening around the place that you may wish to be part of:

  • One of our members , Philip du Guesclin needs some help to catch and band the short tailed Shearwaters at Griffiths Island on Sun 25th April, before they take off for the northern hemisphere summer He will be meeting at the rotunda at 1915 hrs and again the same time Mon 26th if Sunday's weather is inclement. Phone Philip on 55681685 mobile 0438313305.
  • If you are in Melbourne from April 30 – May 2nd, try and find some time to visit the Going Green Expo at the Exhibition centre. www.goinggreenexpo.com.au
  • We have entered in the Clean Beach Awards this year and a judge is coming to town this week to check us out. Not sure what time yet. I may ring around when I find out to see if some of us can meet him or her for two hours (possibly Thursday 11.00 – 1.00)
  • We are waiting on Ann to advise us of the new Harris St Working Bee Roster. It should be starting real soon.
  • Marty Gent starts the Coast Action Coastcare Facilitators position on April 27th.
  • Our next meeting is May 4th. Shannon McKay has accepted an offered to speak to us about Whales and her visit to the Antarctic last summer.

Cheers Don.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Conservation 5 Day Breaks

Make the most of your holidays and volunteer with us

South West Region

What’s on for Autumn 2010!

To book on these projects shown below, contact our South West Office on

(03) 5551 3331, email jlee@conservationvolunteers.com.au

For more information contact us or book online at www.conservationvolunteers.com.au

Project Cost: 5 day Conservation Breaks cost $208 ($120 for students) which includes all meals, accommodation and project related transport. Some concessions are available. $50 deposit required upon booking and recommended at least 2 weeks prior to the project. Cancellation fees may apply.

Note that all projects are free of charge unless you need food and accommodation

The Points Arboretum Grassland Restoration Project 1 of 2

Dates: 26th April – 30th April

Project type: Better Earth

Description: Join this volunteer project in the Great South West. The Points Arboretum holds Australia's registered Eucalyptus collection. You can find 1,200 different species of plant at the park including 500 different Eucalypt species. Our job for the week will help maintain the park for future generations. The main task will be to protect native grassland species by removing scrub.

On this project we will also have a tour of the Aboretum, visit the Eucalyptus Discovery Centre and stop at Wannon Falls.

Grange Burn working Bee

Dates: 03rd May – 07th May

Project type: Better Earth

Description: Come and join our project in the great south west. The Grange Burn River runs though the town of Hamilton on the far side of the Grampians on its way to the larger Wannon river system. We will be working on a section from Lake Hamilton for about 2 km removing woody weeds.

This will be a great project for anyone interested in waterway restoration, ID of woody weeds or anyone looking to have good fun and get fit whilst helping our natual environment.

Other activities in the South West

We run conservation activities every week in the South west region. Activities include weed work, tree planting, radio tracking, fencing, bird box creation, tree banding, wetland work, hide creation and beach clean ups. All of our work takes us to some of the most beautiful locations in our great south west. An ideal place to make some new friends!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Basalt to Bay NING

Hey Folks just to let you know Basalt to Bay Landcare Network has a NING online social network page here : http://b2blcn.ning.com/?xg_source=badge . NING is an online social community where you can start blogs and discussions about issues relevant to you, post and watch videos on topics that interest you, talk live to people or share photos and stories. It has the potential to be an invaluable resource to Landcare, helping to link people over vast distances.

We allready have a few members and I've posted about 30 videos across a range of Landcare issues, that are well worth watching.

Check it out and feel free to join !

Cheers,

Richard.

Seminar on Soil Carbon and Pasture Cropping

PRESS RELEASE: SEMINAR ON SOIL CARBON AND PASTURE CROPPING
To be held at Glenormiston College on Thursday 22 April from 10 am till 3.30 pm
Entry Free, with a free lunch, but bookings essential for catering purposes:

The speakers at the Soil Seminar will be Dr. Christine Jones and Colin Seis, the pasture cropping expert.

Dr. Christine Jones has led the way on Soil Carbon Sequestration. This is really exciting science, as farmers will need this knowledge in the near future. We are facing a time when fertilizers derived from fossil fuels will be much more expensive. We will need the science of soil carbon sequestration in order to build up soil fertility and water holding capacity. At some time in the near future we may also need to be able to offset penalties for animals that emit greenhouse gases. Raising the carbon in soils and taking it from the atmosphere could help reduce the greenhouse effect. This would not only benefit the planet, but also could benefit farmers by allowing them to use the soil as a carbon offset.

Colin Seis is the leading exponent of pasture cropping: Pasture cropping is the combining of cropping and grazing into one land management system where each one benefits the other. The potential for profit and environmental health in being able to do this is enormous and a lot of landholders in many regions of Australia are showing this to be the case.

Please contact me if you need further information.
Cheers,
Gillian Blair tel: 55 676 273

New Section : Resource Update - Update 1

Hey Folks how are you all ? Well I hope !
I thought that rather than sending out volumous amounts of emails to the network I would do a fortnightly update of resource links (groups/programs/events and so on) that have come my way.

So here's the first update.

New links you might find usefull include :
  • Australian Landcare Framework : http://www.landcarefacilitator.com.au/public/content/ViewCategory.aspx?id=48
  • National Landcare Facilitator Project : http://www.landcarefacilitator.com.au/public/content/ViewCategory.aspx?id=52
  • Agri-Doo : Nutrient management & soil health : http://www.agridoo.com.au/
  • Network South West Consulting : Communications, community engagement, consulting & design workhttp://www.networksw.com.au/
  • Soils Health Group : http://www.networksw.com.au/index.php/soils-project
  • Conservation Volunteers : http://www.conservationvolunteers.com.au/ (SW Regional Manger Jonathon Lee : 55513331)
  • O2 media : Public Relations and Marketinghttp://www.o2media.com.au/
  • Volunteers @ Warrnambool : http://www.warrnambool.vic.gov.au/Page/Page.asp?Page_Id=634&p=1
  • Victorian Environment Friends Network : http://home.vicnet.net.au/~friends/index.html
  • Environmental Farmers Network : http://www.environmentalfarmersnetwork.net.au/
  • South West Victoria Brolga Research Project : http://victorianbrolgastudy.com.au/
  • Brolgas at BIRD : http://bird.net.au/bird/index.php?title=Brolga
  • Brolga Breeding Habitat Threats : http://bioacoustics.cse.unsw.edu.au/birding-aus/2003-03/msg00142.html
  • Brolga Fact Sheet : http://brg.cma.nsw.gov.au/uploads///Factsheet10_Brolga.pdf
  • List of generations and how they communicate : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generations#List_of_generations

And 1 you should all know :
  • The Victorian Landcare Gateway : http://www.landcarevic.net.au/

Thursday, April 1, 2010

AGM and Recruitment Drive

Basalt to Bay Landcare Network will be hosting it's annual AGM and recruitment drive on Thursday April 29th between 7-9 pm, at the Port Fairy Yacht Club on the banks of the Moyne River.

As part of our AGM we will be looking for new volunteer members to join our steering committe and our member groups.

To make the event more interesting we'll have 2 speakers for the evening. Peter Forster will be talking about carbon credits and The Environmental Farmers Network. We also hope to have Inka Veltheim - PHD student from the Univesity of Ballarat, talk about the South West Brolga Research Project.

Dinner will be supplied. Numbers are limited, so you'll need to get in fast. To register your interest contact me Richard Hudson on 0458 268 119 or email richardb2b@gmail.com .

Thanks to the Department of Planning and Community Development for sponsoring the evening and Glenelg Hopkins CMA for Landcare related materials.

Successfull Landcare Forum

Last Thursday 25th March, the network held what we hope to be our annual Landcare forum in Port Fairy.

About 15 people from key groups in the region & interested farmers participated in exploring the past, present & future of Landcare in our region. Participants heard 3 presentations on :
  • Challenges & Trends in Landcare
  • Environmental Volunteerism
  • The Impact of Climate Change on Farming in the Region.
They also participated in exploring the challenges currently facing Landcare in our region & potential solutions to these issues.

All in all it was a great day. Lots of opportunities for networking and for finding new ways forward for individual groups. Key issues to arise out of the day include :
  • How to sustain Landcare in the face of funding uncertainty
  • How to recruit more young people into Landcare
  • How to use local volunteer groups to support Landcare groups & Landcare projects
  • New roles for Landcare in food, energy, water, carbon & improving human health.
Lots of ideas arose out of the days explorations and discussions and it is anticipated that these will make a usefull contribution to rejuvinating Landcare in our region.

Presentations from the forum, will be availible on the website in the next fortnight here : http://www.basalttobay.org.au/ . We hope that this is the first of many annnual Landcare forums for Basalt to Bay. We anticipate that the next forum will be held in September 2011.

Thanks to our sponsors the Glenelg Hopkins CMA and the Department of Planning & Community Development.