The Friends of
Shenton Bushland
Inc.
How will we find our wild hearts inside this city;
How will we find the deep peace?
A. Stevens
Bushland Activities page (blog)
Bushland Management Strategies
Newsletter archive:
Newsletter #53 November 2004
Evaluation of 2004 Activities
Fringe Lily (Thysenotus triandrus) Photo: Dani B-J Oct 2004
This newsletter sets out the work we have done over the past 12 months. At our next meeting we will look at the impact this work has had on the condition of the bushland, and what we need to do for the coming year.
Fire Hazard Management
Our fire hazard management activities included:
- pruning beside paths to facilitate access by fire-fighting equipment
- removing litter from around the bases of habitat trees
- removing dead branches and litter from fire hazard reduction zones near our neighbours (health department, education department, dogšs home)
(The shaded areas on the map indicate where we worked during the 2003/4 summer period).
Time spent: 16 hours
Veldgrass Control
We obtained $4500 (under the State Government Community Conservation Grants Scheme) for veldgrass and bulb spraying this year (to supplement funding from the City of Nedlands).
As part of our funding application we committed ourselves to mapping and manual weed removal. We focused on cutting out Perennial Veldgrass which we find is difficult to kill with herbicides once established, The shaded area on the map show where we hand weeded.
We were also fortunate to obtain assistance from employees of Woodside Energy for one day which greatly helped us in meeting our commitments for weed management.
Time spent: 27 hours (Friends of Shenton Bushland) plus 100 hours (Woodside work day)
Bulbous weed control
Bulbous weed control is also funded from the Community Conservation Grant (for spraying) supplemented with hand weeding.
This year, our hand weeding focused on Watsonias. We hand weeded the northern end of the Watsonia infestation, working our way down towards the southern fence (see shaded areas on the map).
Time spent: 73 hours
Geraldton Carnation Weed Control
Geraldton Carnation weed is controlled entirely by hand weeding. The weeds come up all through spring, so we visit each area several times to make sure we remove all of them before they set seed.
Time spent: 41 hours
Miscellaneous weeds
All through the year (but especially in spring) we maintain a watch for isolated patches of potential new weed invasions .
Time spent: 33 hours
Administration
Financial Management of Shenton Bushland ... our Treasurer (Dorothy) has lodged the quarterly BAS statements (with assistance from Priya) and dealt with routine banking and produced financial statements for committee meetings.
Secretarial ... John has recorded meeting minutes at each of the committee meetings.
Funding applications ... Dani has co-ordinated the preparation of funding applications for 2005 including:
- Community Conservation Grant (asked for $4946 to remove mounds and control weeds)
- Swan Alcoa Landcare Project (asked for $11710 to remove mounds and control weeds)
- Brambles Ltd (asked for $5000 to produce seedlings for planting out) prepared in collaboration with one of our volunteers Catherine and Shenton College
- Junior Landcare Grants (asked for $850 to install bat boxes prepared in collaboration with Howard Flinders (Quintilian) and Joe Tonga
Website ... Dani has managed and upgraded the Friends of Shenton Bushland web site
Newsletters ... Dani has produced the newsletters prior to each committee meeting.
Time Spent: 100 + hours
Issues to address for next year
The 200 hours of bushland activity labour (not counting the 100 hours from the Woodside work day) was performed by a handful (4 or 5) of volunteers donating an average of 1 hour per week.
Our funding applications for next year involve organised workdays, for example, to dig out mounds, and load the soil into skips. Similarly the Brambles grant will involve planting days. We believe that these workdays will be more attractive to our members than the ongoing weeding activity.
The weed spraying (to control veldgrass and bulbous weeds) has given us breathing space to get the other weeds under control (especially Geraldton carnation weed, Pelargonium). Long term weed spraying may not be sustainable ... either financially, or biologically. We need to think about alternative strategies for controlling weeds for the long-term.
Next Meeting
Our next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, 18th November. All welcome (7.30 pm, 117 Derby Road, Shenton Park). We will be continuing our evaluation and planning activities for next year.
End of Year Celebration
We are planning a picnic by the river on Sunday 12th December. Please note this date in your diaries. We plan to meet at the Bishop Street Reserve from 11 am till 2 pm. All welcome.