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
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Newsletter #62 December 2006
Google this!
The large search engine company Google has made available a set of software tools that provide access to their maps and aerial photos (for free!).
This means that we can now display all of our geographic data - our activities, weed maps ... on the web ... making it much more accessible than it currently is on my computer.
I am currently developing a website to enable access to all of this data - some data can already be viewed at the Shenton Bushland website - click on the "Bushland Activities Page" menu link. More will come as I develop convert existing data to the new format.
Check it out! Your comments and suggestions for improvement are welcome.
In the Bushland
Much of our work this year has concentrated on implementing the Swan Alcoa Landcare Project to upgrade bushland quality in the Health Department / Education Department land adjacent to Shenton Bushland.
We planted over 1000 trees in Health Department land over winter, and have been busy with weed control there as well as our normal weed control within Shenton Bushland.
New Management Plan
Last year the City of Nedlands contracted a company to upgrade our management plan (which is now over 10 years old). We were very disappointed with the result - despite the expense it gave us little information that we could use to guide us in our activities. So, we have embarked on writing our own management plan.
Thanks to Kate Brown (bushland advisor at Urban Nature) who put us on the right track with her suggestion that the new management plan should be a repository of all of our past experiences in working in the bushland - showing what we have done in the past, and using the lessons we have learnt from this experience to direct our activities into the future.
Thus, I have spent the past few months compiling all of the information stored on my computer.
The information I have compiled thus far includes:
- maps showing locations of specific weeds
- areas where we have been actively hand weeding
- areas sprayed by contractors
- results of bushland monitoring showing impacts of our activities
The weeds we have information for include:
- blackflag
- bridal creeper
- cape tulip
- flinders ranges wattle
- freesia
- geraldton carnation weed
- lachenalia
- pelargonium
- veldgrass
- watsonia
- miscellaneous weeds
The next stage is to look at all of this information, review how well our bushland management strategies are currently working, and plan out our activities for the coming year(s).
This work will be the focus of our next committee meeting - on the afternoon of Sunday 3rd December beginning 4:15 pm at the Matilda Bay kiosk. We welcome all interested members to come along, celebrate the work and achievements of the past year, and contribute to our planning for the coming year.
If you have suggestions for making the meeting fun as well as productive, please let our secretary (John) know. I have heard rumours that he is planning to put on a pantomime of a biblical story relating to a Dalek exterminating pelargoniums. Someone else has suggested that we could sing carols with a bushland regeneration theme. All suggestions will be taken seriously!
Next Meeting
Sunday 3rd December beginning 4:15 pm at the Matilda Bay kiosk. Review and plan bushland activities for coming year. Contact Dani (9381 3470 or bojel@it.net.au) for details.