Earthkeepers is an old world, mystical ecology program for Stage 2 students and some little munchkins from Boronia Park are now well on their way to becoming Level 1 Earthkeepers after completing our 3 day camp. We were impressed with their energy and enthusiasm and can see that they now have a broader understanding of how humans and natural systems rely on each other.
Thanks so much to our parent helpers and teachers Angie and Josh for putting in the hard yards over the three days to give the students the best possible camp!
Enjoy the photos and I hope that the students discover the final meanings of E.M. in their studies back at school.
If you would like to run Earthkeepers at your school please see the program details here.
Imagine if trees in the Sydney basin were humans and we could age group them into babies, infants, children, teenagers, young adults and so on. What would be the age demographic near you? Here at Brewongle we have some teenagers, young adults and a smattering of adults, but very few grandparents. These thoughts entered my head today via an arborist who gave me pause to consider the different time scale that trees live by. In a human lifetime, a eucalypt tree may only just be entering young adulthood.
We humans have successfully removed most of the grand old gnarly, hollow bearing, life giving, shady, deep rooted, beautiful, wise trees from our parks, bushland, backyards and reserves. They have become mulch, firewood, houses and are often removed as ‘dangerous’. They are now nothing but a shadow in an earthly memory. Many of us will never live to see our current trees grow to a grand old age where limbs are sagging and the tree has become a hotel for literally millions of living things. So where are my wistful ramblings leading you ask? Well, I do have a point….. and that is that due to our propensity for chopping trees, we are severely lacking in habitat spaces for many of our tree hollow loving native critters (over 300 species need hollows). Question is, what can we do about it? – especially in a highly urbanised city like Sydney? One immediate answer is to build replacement habitat. We are a hasty species compared to trees and other homeless creatures don’t have the time to wait for trees to form hollows on their own (100 yrs or more), so we can augment young trees with nest boxes and other homely developments for our furry and feathery friends.
Many schools, councils, landcare groups, government agencies and individuals have put up nest boxes in the hope of providing a home for a willing local species. Here at Brewongle we have a nest box trail that is in need of some maintenance and care. Today I attended a brilliant day organised by Greater Sydney Local Land Services (The old CMA people with a new name). “Hollows for Habitat” showcased best practice in nest boxes and improving hollows for fauna habitat. I would like to share with you some of the best bits and give you food for thought if you currently have, or are thinking of installing habitat boxes. Here are some questions to ask yourself before buying, making and installing nest boxes:
What is your target species?(what sort of tenant do you want in your box?)
Are these species already in your area? If not how will they find your box? (“If you build it, will they come?”)
Do you target a threatened, or common species?
Is there food sources for your target species nearby?
How does your box meet the needs of your proposed tenant? (ie opening size, number of bedrooms…)
How will you exclude unwanted squatters (like brush-tailed possums)
How long do you want your box to last (as long as possible?)
How will you attach it to the tree without causing undue damage and allowing for tree growth?
How high on the tree?
What aspect will it be facing?
How will you monitor who takes up your ‘for lease’ ad in the local wildlife gazette?
As ‘nestboxing’ (my term) seems to be an emerging science, many of these questions may be answered by trial and error. Here is some things I learned today.
It may take a while for animals to take up your lease and move in on any sort of permanent basis. Be patient.
Marine ply boxes do not last long. Lid failure is a major issue.
Hardwood (timber mill offcuts are good) is longest lasting for box structure (maybe up to 25 years), but is heavy (causing sweat and swearing during installation)
Openings facing the trunk reduce the chance of bees and possums excluding your desired species.
providing bedding material (ie peat moss or dry mulch) and a ‘ladder’ (ie grooves in face plate) near entrance and inside will make it more attractive to prospective tenants.
A hinged lid makes for easier monitoring. Rubber hinges can replace metal that will rust.
Using strapping and tech screws to attach to the trunk will cause stress to the tree and will not last long.
Two suggested attachment methods – wire around trunk with protective outer plastic coating (ie garden hose) and ziz zags in the wire to allow for stretching as tree grows. 2nd method suggested by arborists – drill right through the trunk and attach with a large bolt and nut.
Ensure it is watertight and dry – drill any holes facing down so water does not enter
A side opening can make for easier monitoring – especially bat boxes
Avoid paint near entrance hole as many animals will chew on this.
PVC boxes are lightweight, cheap and easy to install but are poorly insulated and will not withstand fire!
Design your box for your species – there are now plenty of successful designs out there. Ask for help from local council or other agencies.
Monitor how well it works! Use cameras, manual observations to discover species use. Data can easily be uploaded to the Atlas of Living Australia website so it benefits us all! They can help with species ID too.
Think of ground hollows, aquatic hollows and perches and other coarse woody material on your site.
Note the zig zag wire to allow for tree growth – also the ‘ladders’
It was inspiring to hear of many councils who are attempting to retain dead trees and ‘dangerous’ trees in the landscape and augment them with artificial, chainsaw made hollows. This was really interesting and is also a way to speed up the decay process that makes hollows. A dead tree may be pruned, then artificial hollows created by an arborist. We had a demonstration by a very skilled arborist on a cut stump.
I feel like this is the time of year for a bit of connection to some real things in life! Nothing about Christmas consumerism, busy shops, parties, politics or school reports. Here follows a few cool things I have come across in a pictorial journal from my phone. All mostly extra-curricular….
Hawkesbury Earthcare Fair
The Hawkesbury Earthcare Centre’s spring fair was as lovely event filled with sustainability, good food, music and of course our kid friendly Blender Bike! It was hot hot hot and the smoothies we produced via pedal power were enjoyed by all.
Our recently rediscovered huge Port Jackson Fig excelled itself with fruit production this year and these little ripe morsels are quite tasty as far as bush tucker goes. Our local bird population feasted for weeks I think as there are none left now! These were a favoured bush food for the Darug people.
The Hawkesbury River
I managed a couple of early morning bike rides to Lower Portland before work – training for the Sydney to the Gong bike ride. This is a shot of our beautiful river in the morning mist.
Koala Scratchings?
The Great Koala Count saw me wandering over the Kurrajong escarpment looking for our furry little friends. The word must have been out in the koala community that I was coming – as I saw not a single one! About ten different people described koala encounters they had recently had around Kurrajong….. how come I missed out?
Me ‘n Costa
A recent weekend saw the launch of the Youth Food Movement in the Hawkesbury. A lovely wholesome event put on by UWS Food Sustainability Students. The YFM has grown from the vision of two amazing young women to have more than 13000 followers all interested in sustainable and healthy food production and consumption. The highlight for me was sitting next to Costa (from Gardening Australia) and having a good yack about all topics. Brilliant man (and a brilliant beard!).
A rejuvenating bushwalk on Sunday in the National Park behind my house gave me some hope amongst all the current environmental doom and gloom. Crystal clear rainforest streams, huge turpentine trees and an old, large yabby that I rescued from a trap (apologies to whoever had ideas of yabby stew for dinner.). The poor thing was all tangled up in string and had obviously been thrashing about trying to free itself. With the help of some broken glass I cut it free and sent it on its merry way.
A living waterfall
Tree roots cascaded down a small waterfall and had become the path for water – an incredible living system of moss, algae, roots and who knows what else. Brilliant. A powerful owl (Ninox strenua) gave me a disdainful look as I stumbled upon it roosting on a vine with a small mammal in its claws. What an huge, awesome creature who was not bothered by my presence at all.
Powerful Owl
I walked back via a recent hazard reduction burn and discovered plenty of regrowth. The photo below is interesting as it shows bush recovering from two burns. The left of the track was burnt last year and to the right was burnt about two months ago.
The last feature to make me jump was a delicious diamond python snake sunning itself on the road outside my house. It took a bit of noise from me to get it off the road and out of the paths of cars. It did nonchalantly slither off eventually.
Once again we are indebted to the lovely students and staff from Mt Druitt Tutorial School for their bush regeneration efforts last Friday. Perfect cool weather allowed us to continue lantana removal in our patch of critically endangered Shale Sandstone Transition Forest. Angus, Kyla and Emma from Blue Tongue Ecosystems came along to lend a hand and provide tools and expertise.
We came across some amazing incidental wildlife sightings including an old ringtail possum drey, two spotted pardalotes building their underground nest, a brush-tailed possum and our cute little shrike thrushes nesting again. The awareness and appreciation of nature by the students gave me hope that the next generation will look after our natural resources. We hope to see the students back here next term when we begin to replant some of the species that are missing from our patch of bush. Thanks to the Windsor to Weir funding which has now allowed us to remove lantana and plant native species along the Hawkesbury River below Brewongle and also begin work up the banks on Brewongle land.
We experience plenty of warm fuzzy feelings while doing our jobs as environmental educators but yesterday began with a lovely and remarkable happening. We were welcoming year 8 students from Broken Hill and Willyama High Schools to our field site at White Leeds Wetlands with an acknowledgement of country (This is a way to give our respect to the traditional Aboriginal people of this land). Sue Saxby from Wambangalang EEC near Dubbo was delivering a heartfelt acknowledgement of the Wilyakali people of Broken Hill and finished with a lovely sentiment of all peoples walking hand in hand to a better future. So here we all were sitting under a cobalt blue sky, black kites flying overhead and the river red gums stirring in the morning breeeze and when Sue finished her statement all the students (who were predominantly non-Aboriginal by the way) gave a spontaneous and moving round of applause – all with smiles and respect in their eyes. It was truly moving for all of us and something that I have not witnessed before. It gives me hope for the future as these fine young people grow up to be elders in their own community. The teachers decided to mix the two schools together and it was another lovely aspect to see how they made new friends and interacted outside their usual social groups.
The activities began and today these talented students were studying the mighty Australian bird of prey – the wedge-tailed eagle. By assessing the water quality, following a GPS treasure hunt to unlock clues about this huge raptor and making movies about the quality of local habit for the eagle and its prey the students developed an understanding of the local ecology and hopefully developed more connections to this amazing country they live in at Broken Hill.
Kelly’s creek flows into White Leeds Wetlands and Sanctuary Lake and has high water levels due to treated sewage from two local treatment plants being discharged up stream. Our intrepid science students assessed the quality of this water and found high levels of salt (which is usually difficult to remove in treating effluent) and turbidity (cloudiness mostly due to algae). The algal levels reflect the high nutrient content of the water. These findings have consequences for living things in the creek and acording to Travis Nadge of White Leeds Station, the natural filtration systems in Sanctuary Lake help to remove these issues and produce clean water in the last holding pond on the property.
By then end of the day, students discovered some good, healthy habitat for eagles and also plenty of habitat for animals that the eagle may need to eat. We may publish some of these videos in the future – so keep your eye out for them.
The Outback Outreach crew packed up our gear after the students left and felt that we had been a part of a special day thanks to the students and staff of these two high schools. The day was topped off for us by finding a gnarly shingleback lizard on the way out and then a trip to the Living Desert to see yet another outback sunset. Our last sunset in Broken Hill and nearly the end of a fantastic trip to this unique part of NSW and Australia.
I will blog again of our journeys home if I can and I would also like to thank Mark Edwards – Principal of Brewongle EEC who put a huge amount of work into organising the Outback Outreach program but could not join us due to illness. We missed you Mark and look forward to next year when you can join us on the long roads west.
Wall to wall blue skies, enthusiastic, skilled students and a beautiful wetland setting just 2km outside Broken Hill made for a brilliant day of outdoor studies. We met Burke Ward PS, Alma PS and Railway Town PS students, staff and parents for a day of “Dragon Diagnostics” at White Leeds Station. There is much more than just mining in Broken Hill!
With Kellys Creek and some majestic but very young river gums as a backdrop, students ate up our smorgasbord of activities. Our theme this year was investigating the Inland Bearded Dragon and students rotated through a GPS treasure hunt challenge with Longneck Lagoon EEC, the always fun water quality analysis and dipnetting with Wambangalang EEC and habitat iMovie making with Brewongle EEC.
We were very impressed with the motivation and knowledge of all the students and we all came out more aware of this cool reptile (we did not see any unfortunately!) and its habitat requirements, threats and food sources.
Thanks to Travis Nadge and White Leeds Station for providing a fantastic venue for our day and a HUGE thank you to the students and staff of the attending schools.
The day was topped off for us with a visit to the old mining town of Silverton (best known as the setting for the Mad Max films) and the stunning lookout over the Mundi Mundi plains. We watched the earth turn and the sun set over a vast plain that made me feel just a trifle insignificant and extremely grateful for this incredible planet we live on.
Our annual migration to western New South Wales is under way. We have just driven from the Sydney basin clean across this huge state of ours to Broken Hill. I love how NSW unfolds itself (literally) as you leave behind the creases of the Great Dividing Range and head into the west. Dubbo marks the last of any significant relief in the topography until you have paid your dues on the long flat roads to Nyngan, Cobar and Wilcannia. After that the stony hills of Broken hill emerge over the never ending horizon and seem somehow small under the yawning sky above.
View this blog online to see a slideshow of our travels. The photos are worth a squizz!
The long and not so winding roads of western NSW drill you through some amazing vegetation, degradation and plenty of goats. Between Nyngan, Cobar and Wilcannia, herds of nonchalant feral goats graze by the roadside and wreak obvious havoc on the local landscape. The hard hoofs and large appetites were denuding much of the grasses, herbs and shrubbery that only became more plentiful after we crossed the Darling River at Wilcannia and encountered less goats.
Each year several EEC’s team up to bring our enviro ed roadshow to the bush and engage as many students as we can some form of ecological or sustainability education. This year Longneck Lagoon EEC and Brewongle made up the Western Sydney contingent and we picked up Wambangaland EEC from Dubbo on the way. Broken Hill schools are our target and we are ready for a few days of examining the unique White Leeds Wetlands just outside the mine tailings mountains of southern Broken Hill.
A rogue tweet from Longneck Lagoon EEC landed us in the local ABC radio studios to discuss our adventures (I guess having some news other than mining in Broken Hill is exciting). It was excellent to be able to discuss our planned curriculum based ecology programs over the airwaves.
Stay tuned for the next blog installment as we meet the students of Broken Hill and study the reptile habitat in some unique water cleansing wetlands in this dry dry land.
There is something inherently satisfying about pulling out weeds – don’t you agree? Managing ecosystems is a tricky complex business, but pulling out and poisoning noxious problem plants like lantana is a real, hands on result orientated activity. You can see and measure progress and I swear I could hear the native plants sighing as we removed choking thickets of smelly, prickly lantana. Lantana is a garden plant (from South America originally) that causes major issues in our native bush. It can choke the shrub layer and even grow up into the canopy. It excludes native plants and changes local ecosystems – often to the detriment of the trees – see this information on Bell Miner Associated Dieback.
Angus Reynolds from Blue Tongue Ecosystems providing instruction.
We spent the day on Wednesday with Blue Tongue Ecosystems who are an excellent local bush regeneration company as well as some fantastic students and staff from Mt Druitt Tutorial School. The aim of the day was to remove as many weeds as we could from our surrounding bushlands and gardens. What an incredible job we all did! The students and staff took to the work with gusto, discovering how to use various tools and chemicals as well as avoiding too many lantana scratches. Thanks so much to Mt Druitt Tutorial School and we look forward to seeing you again in the future! A huge thanks to the staff of Blue Tongue who were professional, efficient and helped our property immensly.
Before…After!
We have had an ongoing issue with weeds here at Brewongle. Our critically endangered Shale Sandstone Transition Forest is doing its best despite a long history of human disturbance. We have photos showing most of our forest was felled in the early 1900’s and has since regenerated to some degree. We seem to be missing a few species and have an ongoing problem with weed invasion. Many of our trees are not old enough to form tree hollows (which can take up to 100yrs to form) and hence we are missing some vital animal habitat also. To combat this in the short term we have installed many different bird and possum nest boxes to supplement the few tree hollows available.
The year 9 students of Tyndale Christian School in Blacktown were treated to a plethora of arboreal delights this week. Using our nest box cameras they explored various habitat boxes around Brewongle for signs of life. During their testing they discovered four possums, some feathers, nests, goanna scratchings, animal scats, clean water and a healthy forest The students were enjoying our Lace Monitor science program for stage 5. This program encourages students to gather data on our local ecosystems here at Brewongle. The students then have to decide whether Brewongle has sufficient habitat and food sources to support a population of Lace Monitor lizards (also called Goanna’s.)
One video below shows some of the wildlife that the students captured on film and the other provides details on the Lace Monitor – one of the coolest predators in the forest.
Book now to involve your students in this fantastic program to ‘bring back the bush’ to Western Sydney. A great day out where students will contribute to their local environments by planting habitat trees to help the return of native animals. Stream bank planting will help protect and improve water quality. I would highly recommend this excursion for your class, green team or leadership group. They provide and pay for buses too!
Visit the website or follow the link below to register.
Brewongle Environmental Education Centre 