FoMM Newsletter – February 2025

Working Party @ Drainage Ditch on Sunday 16 February 9 am – noon

Where: Along the drainage ditch which runs from near the Hackett tank to the suburban back fences in Rivett St. Meet near the Hackett tank.

What:  Removal of Japanese Honeysuckle Lonicera japonica, Ivy Hedera spp. and Privets Ligustrum spp.from the ditch; spreading wood chip mulch on the adjacent area where dense Chilean Needle Grass Nassella neesiana has been sprayed earlier.

Wear: Clothes which cover your limbs and sturdy shoes; bring drinking water, sunscreen and garden gloves if you have them. We provide tools and gloves and a delicious homemade cake for morning tea. No experience necessary – all welcome including children.

Please come early for an introduction and give as much time as you can spare.

For more information and a map of the location see here.

Japanese Honeysuckle Lonicera japonica is an invasive plant in many areas of the world – see Wikipedia or Weeds ofAustralia for more information.

This photo of the fruit is courtesy of Canberra NatureMapr.

Report on January Activities

January started with good rainfall in summer storms, and the small dam on the drainage line in the boundary area near Valour Park now has water in it again after being completely dry for a while.

St John’s Wort and woody weeds have been the focus for January.  On Sunday 19 January volunteers attacked the Sweet Briars Rosa rubiginosa near the small dam – there were lots, some large and very fruitful. So, the Monday@The Fair group returned there on the Australia Day holiday to continue the attack on briars and also to remove Hawthorns Crataegus monogyna.

 

Jodie and Hamish cut and dab small Hawthorns, spreading into the reserve from Valour Park.

Photo by Barb Read.

Earlier in January some St John’s Wort had been sprayed as new stems grew after the summer rain.  The Monday@The Fair group took on the tedious task of treating mostly small St John’s Wort stems growing in the three seed nodes.  Dabbing tiny stems as if they were a woody weed is time consuming, and the upper node still needs more attention. But the lowest seed node which has had most attention, may now have hardly any St John’s Wort, fingers crossed.

On Australia Day, Waltraud spotted this butterfly, a Chequered Copper Lucia limbaria feeding on a Sticky Everlasting Xerochrysum viscosum, one of the wildflowers planted in the lowest seed node.  This is a new butterfly species for Mount Majura – what great news!

Photo courtesy of Canberra NatureMapr.

In mid-January, the Monday@The Fair group went further afield to the section of the reserve near the underpass which gives access to the other side of the Federal Highway.  This area had some woody weeds mapped earlier and a Ngunnawal crew of trainees with team leader Kie Barratt have been there to cut some down, such as a cluster of Knife Leaf Wattles Acacia cultriformis, non-local wattles which have invaded from plantings on the Highway verges.

Knife Leaf Wattle in bloom in September, very pretty but invading from the Federal Highway, displacing local species which could be growing in this area of endangered grassy woodland.

Photo courtesy of Canberra NatureMapr.

The narrow section of the reserve closest to the underpass is surrounded on three sides with weedy areas – the Highway verges and leased land where obviously there has been little attention paid to invasive species like Blackberries Rubus anglocandicans,which is a weed of national significance (WoNS), and Cootamundra Wattles, SweetBriars, Hawthorns and Firethorns.  The result is that this section of the reserve now has large Blackberry bushes and woody weeds which are too big for volunteers to tackle.  Chain sawing will be needed and contractor spraying of the Blackberries.  Volunteers can do smaller woody weeds and map what needs to be done, so this is what the Monday@The Fair group did on 20 January.

Terry and Hamish attack a small clump of Blackberry and Sweet Briar in the area of the reserve near the Federal Highway underpass.

Photo by Barb Read.

NatureMapr App

Updated versions of the NatureMapr data collection app are now live for both iPhone and Android!

If you would like to do the citizen science thing, or help locating important weeds for FoMM to tackle, this may be just the thing for you.  It’s easy to use. Search in the App Store or Google Play for NatureMapr or go to the NatureMapr website and click on the appropriate button at the top of the screen.  The app lets you take photos of a sighting and upload them to NatureMapr from within the app.

You don’t need to use the app to contribute to NatureMapr. You can take photos making sure you have the location setting turned on and upload them from your gallery using the Add a sighting tab on the NatureMapr website.

Conservation Challenges

Among all the politics of the failure of the federal government to pass its environmental legislation at the end of 2024, perhaps you missed some important achievements it did make in partly meeting its commitments to the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF).  In October it released Australia’s Strategy for Nature 2024-2030 as our National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP) which is required under the GBF. You can download this document here. It sets goals and objectives with measures to be assessed to gauge progress; these are aligned with the targets of the GBF. It has been endorsed by all the environment ministers, state and territory as well as federal.

Before the Convention on Biological Diversity Conference of the Parties (COP16) held in Colombia in October, Australia submitted 9 national targets based on the NBSAP to the GBF Secretariat. These national targets incorporate 13 of the 23 GBF targets. The NBSAP itself say “Not all Global Biodiversity Framework targets are mapped. The enablers of change support action against all Global Biodiversity Framework targets and Australia will report against all 23 targets.”

Enablers of change are methods that support the delivery of the transformational change required to meet Australia’s national targets. There are three enablers.  One is ensuring that nature is included in all legislation and decision making at all levels.  Another is that decision making about nature should be equitable and involve first nations people. The third is that environmental data should be accessible to support decision making.  This third target is to be a role of Environment Information Australia, which is to be established in the legislation which is yet to be passed in parliament.

The Biodiversity Council is concerned that the NBSAP does not mention GBF target 18 – the identification and elimination of biodiversity harmful subsidies – and it has produced a report on the level of federal government subsidies which are impacting biodiversity. This has important implications for how the NBSAP can be funded, as the subsidies they identified are about 50 times greater than what the federal government currently spends on nature.

So, what happened at COP 16?  It did not get a lot of mention in the media.  A report from The Nature Conservancy outlines what was achieved in Colombia. Discussions are to resume this February in Rome, according to the official website.  These discussions will largely be about financing.

Rewilding – part 1

Nature’s Ghosts – The World We Lost and How to Bring It Back.  Sophie Yeo 2024 Publisher Harper North

For a fascinating read try this recently published book. It’s in the ACT library.

The focus is Britain and Europe generally but there are snippets from other parts of the world, and lessons for all of us. Based on modern science, archaeology and pre-history this book reveals the secrets of past environments, going way, way back to before the last ice age, to times when the only people in Europe were Neanderthals, not Homo sapiens. It looks at the impacts of humanity on wild landscapes, and how persistent some impacts are over millennia. We cannot remake our landscapes to recreate such ancient wilderness where people were a minor component of the environment; there are stories about choosing appropriate baselines and avoiding some assumptions when attempting rewilding.

Rewilding – part 2

Emus for Tasmania?

See this story from The Conversation.

Emus in the ACT? Yes, but only west of the Murrumbidgee. For great photos see Canberra Birds.

This emu was photographed last October by Harrisi along the Paddys River Road.

Photo courtesy of Canberra NatureMapr.

Rewilding – part 3 – Landscape Regeneration in Tasmania (and elsewhere)

See this photo story from the ABC.

Rewilding – part 4

Read this paper “Indigenous knowledge and the shackles of wilderness

Wildlife@Home

Living with Wildlife – A Guide for our Homes and Backyards. Tanya Loos 2024 Publisher CSIRO

Another recent book in the ACT library full of facts about wildlife you might encounter at your place, and how to cope with these creatures and enjoy having them there.

(You can skip the section on cassowaries, and it would be a miracle if a koala came to visit!)

There is a section on “Is it okay to feed wildlife?” as many people do with pleasure, but the wildlife friendly approach is definitely do not feed. Below is a table from the book about alternatives to feeding. You will have to read the book to see all the arguments on this topic.

An Australian King-Parrot Alisterus scapularis feeding on Kangaroo Apple Solanum linearifolium fruits in a Watson garden.

Photo courtesy of Canberra NatureMapr.

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