News – older
October 2023 – Flowering eucalypts
2023 wasn't the best year for spring wildflowers however several of our eucalypts had great displays.
September 2023 – Seedling monitoring
We did the first careful assessment of the newly planted seedings and considering the poor winter and spring rains, they are looking great: maybe 5% have died and a few have been nibbled by the locals.
We selected 21 seedlings across the plantings for monitoring: these were marked, GPSed, measured and photographed, and will be measured regularly to give a more scientific assessment of the progress.
September 2023 – New fence
Our farming neighbours to the west of our top paddock are planning to run sheep in the adjacent paddock soon and contacted us with concerns the existing fence would not keep sheep away from our succulent young seedlings. He suggested his team could do the work if we paid for the materials, which we agreed to and it's done and cost us $6,345 – the bills keep coming!
August 2023 – Scrap steel and batteries gone!
A major junk cleanup has happened courtesy of a scrap metal merchant who collected most of the old farm machinery, cars and metal junk and the 50+ old lead-acid batteries recently. And it was all quite valuable, since he paid us $2,621. The area around the house and shed are looking much more respectable but there's still lots to be done.
A DBCA botanical officer visited to inspect the new populations of the rare and endangered Acacia lobulata we have discovered on this block (and which have increased the world's known number of specimens from 75 to over 300!).
Some time ago we discovered a box of dynamite in the farm shed and reported this to the police. They promised to come and investigate and in mid May a big white truck and three officers from the Police Bomb Response Unit arrived which seemed like an overkill. However we learnt the dynamite becomes unstable with age and can explode when moved. So out of the truck rolled an impressive remotely controlled robot which was used to transport the box into the open away from our shed and equipment, and where is was burnt on a bed of paper and liquid fuel – no explosion! We thank the WA Police.
May 2023 – Flora survey donations – please
Andy's farming cousin managed to get two of the old farm machinery working and moved other junk machinery to better locations, together with more cleaning up.
Sadly little has progressed on the 50 years of old farm machinery and related junk. Several dump trips were completed to partially clear the large shed to provide under cover storage to dry out the collected seeds. We hope that a few of the more serviceable machinery can be sold and we are exploring ways to find buyers.
February 2023 – New constitution completed
We have been working on a new constitution for our association and have received wonderful pro bono assistance from lawyers K&L Gates – many thanks to their team. Our existing constitution uses the 'default' rules since we needed to become incorporated urgently to purchase this land upon hearing that another party was about to make a offer. Our new constitution includes many improvements and the required clauses to help us apply for DGR tax deductable donation status. It will be considered at our forthcoming AGM.
While working for the Department of Wildlife in the 1970s when this land was proposed for sale as farmland, Steve recognised its importance and recommended it be preserved – advice not taken, so it makes us very proud that our efforts will help to right that historic government decision.
Members Marion and Peter had read that a rare and endangered plant, Acacia lobulata (Chiddarcooping Wattle) is only known from a few very local locations, and in specific soils below breakaways. Knowing that this block has extensive breakaway areas, they went searching and within an hour had found a patch of about 20 plants. Since then another patch has been found along one firebreak. They hope to find another rare acacia this year – Acacia ascendens, which is only know in the adjacent reserve.
Over the next three days the Rangers collected mainly eucalypts and melaleucas branches and placed them in large open bags under cover in our shed to dry out and drop the seed.
Several further visits are planned to collect other species at the appropriate time, such as the acacias, dodonaea, grevillea Allocasuarinas and hakeas.
We just retrieved the cameras, and hope to analyse the images soon and to be shared in later news. As a small bonus during collection our ecologists bumped into a Common Scaly-foot (Pygopus lepidopodus). This animal may look like a snake, but is a harmless legless lizard.
Animals photographed by motion cameras will help indicate ecological health and non-native predator presence, and we are hoping for other threatened species to add to Malleefowl! We aim to repeat this study to build a record of fauna on the block and see how this changes as we implement conservation controls.
November 2021 – Purchase our first block
We are delighted to announce we have completed the first step in our journey to help preserve Western Australia's unique ecology: the purchasing of our first bush block, located in the wheatbelt! We could not have done this without the incredible support of everyone receiving this newsletter; thank you for your donations and for making our goal become a reality! We would also like to extend thanks to Gondwana Link Ltd for their continued assistance.
Large areas of native bush are rarity in the wheatbelt, as it has undergone widespread clearing for agriculture and is now restricted to small isolated patches. Due to its long unburnt vegetation and the neighbouring Class A Chiddarcooping Nature Reserve the block immediately caught the eye of what were to become the Bush Blocks Guardians (BBG). In 2019 members visited the block and saw the diverse environment and recognised its potential as a conservation property with rich ecological values. This drove the formation of the BBG, beginning an almost two year journey to raise funds, purchase the land and essentially expand the nature reserve.
After 18 months of growing the BBG and sourcing funds, the opportunity was nearly lost when the property went under offer. Fortunately for BBG the finances fell through, and the near loss only increased our drive to secure the land. After additonal donations from our supporters and the committee further increasing our funds, we finally secured the block on the 19th November 2021! Now the conservation efforts at the block can begin!