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Frocks, gumboots and good times at Moonambel
In Spring, the women of north-central Victoria get the opportunity to ‘frock up’, don their gumboots and join with a group of like-minded ladies for a great day’s entertainment at the annual Chicks in the Sticks event.
Organised by the North-Central Catchment Management Authority at a different venue each year, the 2019 Chicks in the Sticks was held at Moonambel Gap Olives at the northern end of the picturesque Pyrenees Ranges.
After a wander through the olive grove and a brief introduction to the history of Moonambel, ladies listened intently to an inspiring talk from the day’s keynote speaker Emma Ayliffe from Summit Ag. An agronomist of just 28 years of age, Emma has already established an impressive reputation in her male-dominated field.
The Kara Kara CMN was one of several sponsors for the event, our aim being to promote the creation of habitat for native wildlife. Whether the ladies came from an urban or rural setting, each had the opportunity to take home a free native habitat plant courtesy of the Network to contribute to their ‘habitat garden’.
Pictured above right: Ladies take a tour of the Moonambel Gap olive grove in the picturesque Pyrenees Ranges (D Saxon-Campbell).
In Spring, the women of north-central Victoria get the opportunity to ‘frock up’, don their gumboots and join with a group of like-minded ladies for a great day’s entertainment at the annual Chicks in the Sticks event.
Organised by the North-Central Catchment Management Authority at a different venue each year, the 2019 Chicks in the Sticks was held at Moonambel Gap Olives at the northern end of the picturesque Pyrenees Ranges.
After a wander through the olive grove and a brief introduction to the history of Moonambel, ladies listened intently to an inspiring talk from the day’s keynote speaker Emma Ayliffe from Summit Ag. An agronomist of just 28 years of age, Emma has already established an impressive reputation in her male-dominated field.
The Kara Kara CMN was one of several sponsors for the event, our aim being to promote the creation of habitat for native wildlife. Whether the ladies came from an urban or rural setting, each had the opportunity to take home a free native habitat plant courtesy of the Network to contribute to their ‘habitat garden’.
Pictured above right: Ladies take a tour of the Moonambel Gap olive grove in the picturesque Pyrenees Ranges (D Saxon-Campbell).
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2019 planting program a regional community effort!
Now completed, the Kara Kara CMN’s annual autumn/winter planting program was a co-ordinated regional community effort that saw over 3,000 native tube-stock planted across 9.5 hectares on six private properties at Kooreh, Rostron, Tottington and Paradise in north-central Victoria. Over 160 volunteers give around 900 hours of their time to prepare and fence the work sites, collect and sort tube-stock, assemble tree guards and plant out the young seedlings before watering them in so they have the best chance of becoming established ahead of the summer heat. Volunteers for this year’s program were a mix of individuals and members from a diverse range of local and regional community groups, including the St Arnaud Neighbourhood House and St Arnaud Norman Simpson Memorial Pipe Band, as well as students from the Pyrenees Primary School Cluster, Donald High School and Charlton Secondary College. Feeding our army of helpers were volunteers from the Kooreh Memorial Hall Committee and the Navarre & District Historical Society. The main aim of the planting program is to create and expand vegetation corridors, or ‘bio-links’, between patches of woodland to better help native wildlife move through the landscape. However, it also brings benefits to landholders by improving land values and farm productivity through the provision of shelter belts for stock. The Kara Kara CMN extends a big thank you to all landholders and volunteers who participated in this year’s planting program. All in all, it was a fantastic community effort! The Kara Kara CMN’s planting program is funded by the Victorian State Government through a three-year Biodiversity On-Ground Action Grant. |
Above: Students from six schools in the Pyrenees Cluster of Primary Schools helped with plantings on a property at Rostron.
Below: Charlton Secondary College students planting native tube-stock at Kooreh, near St Arnaud. 
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Kara Kara CMN hosts Donald HS during 'Green Week'
Monitoring research projects, tree planting and recreating a woodland food web: they’re just some of the activities participated in by Year 9 Donald High School students in the last week of May 2019 during the School’s annual ‘Green Week’. Held in and around the Kara Kara National Park, the three day program was organised and run by the Kara Kara CMN to help students better understand the natural environment and how it’s organised. The focus of this year’s Green Week program was the ecology of native woodlands. Over the three days, students learnt to see beyond the obvious and understand that woodlands aren’t just patches of trees and scrub, but are complex ecosystems with a fascinating array of species interactions and relationships. With those insights, they could then begin to appreciate the processes that can threaten woodland ecosystems, and understand why many of our plant and animal species are threatened with extinction or in decline. Now in its third year with Donald High School, the Kara Kara CMN is looking to make the program available to other schools in Victoria’s north-central region. Pictured left: Above - In a tangle; students use coloured wool to recreate some of the species links in a woodland food web. (Photo: C Campbell) Below - Braving the drizzle to plant a corridor of native trees and shrubs at Kooreh, near St Arnaud. (Photo: D Saxon-Campbell) |
Regional Report Card showcases Network's seminar series
Each year, the North Central Catchment Management Authority (NCCMA) releases a Report Card showcasing regional Landcare achievements and projects over the previous year. So, we were delighted when the NCCMA chose to feature the Kara Kara CMN’s ‘Habitat for Wildlife’ seminar series in its North Central Landcare 2017-18 Report Card [pdf], which has just been released.
This public acknowledgement is a credit to all the Network volunteers who worked so hard to make it happen.
Each year, the North Central Catchment Management Authority (NCCMA) releases a Report Card showcasing regional Landcare achievements and projects over the previous year. So, we were delighted when the NCCMA chose to feature the Kara Kara CMN’s ‘Habitat for Wildlife’ seminar series in its North Central Landcare 2017-18 Report Card [pdf], which has just been released.
This public acknowledgement is a credit to all the Network volunteers who worked so hard to make it happen.
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New homes for threatened and declining wildlife
The return of cooler weather and easing of fire restrictions has seen Network volunteers venture out into native woodland once again to install nest-boxes as part of our ongoing project to improve the quality of habitat for threatened and declining wildlife. Target species for this round of installations include the Brush-tailed Phascogale ‑ a small, tree-dwelling marsupial ‑ and two iconic Australian birds, the Southern Boobook Owl (commonly called the ‘Mopoke’) and the Laughing Kookaburra or ‘Jackass’. The focus of our work is remnant forest that lacks the tree hollows these species need for shelter, protection from predators and breeding. So far, over 80 nest-boxes have been installed in remnant woodland on private properties in the north-central region, which is well on the way to achieving our target of 200 installations by the end of 2020. Funded by the Victorian Government, the Kara Kara CMN’s nest-box project is part of a wider habitat improvement program that also involves revegetation works and community engagement activities. |
Above: A recently-installed Kookaburra nest-box on private land at Carapooee, near St Arnaud.
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Above: Dr Adam Miller of Deakin University explains the latest research on Silver Banksia genetics.
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Silver Banksia news...
The Silver Banksia Project is a collaborative program involving conservation groups across much of Victoria; from Victoria’s volcanic plains to the west of Melbourne through central Victoria to the State’s north-east. In early April, representatives from the Kara Kara CMN and other groups from as far north as central NSW travelled to Dunkeld at the southern end of the Grampians to participate in a Banksia Forum hosted by the Friends of the Forgotten Woodlands (FFW). Focussing on the FFW’s experiences working on Victoria’s volcanic plains, we had the opportunity to visit their Banksia Seed Production Area near Dunkeld and hear the latest research on Silver Banksia genetics and biology. Learnings from the day will help the Kara Kara CMN and other groups in our efforts to save this beautiful native species. |
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Landmate crews lend a hand
Finding enough volunteers for our on-ground projects is always a challenge, especially those tasks that require a specific skill-set. So this year, for the first time, the Kara Kara CMN has taken a slightly different approach, taking advantage of the free labour available for government-funded projects under the Victorian Justice Department’s ‘Landmate’ environmental program. This long-standing program sees supervised prison work crews from correctional centres around rural Victoria provide a range of environment-related services on funded projects, from fencing and revegetation works to weed and feral pest control. Over the course of a week in February 2019, crews from the Hopkins Correctional Centre in Ararat erected stock-exclusion fencing on two farming properties at Beazley’s Bridge and Rostron on the western side of the St Arnaud Range. The work was undertaken as a prelude to our winter revegetation works, which will see several thousand plants put in the ground by volunteers to improve linkages between areas of remnant forest and facilitate wildlife movement through the landscape. The Landmate crew did a great job in what was a ‘win-win’ all round: for the environment, the Kara Kara CMN, and the prisoners who had the opportunity to learn new skills while contributing to the community. Pictured opposite: Top - A newly fenced and ripped area in preparation for our 2019 revegetation program. Bottom - A Landmate crew prepares for work. back to top of page |
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Page last reviewed: 28/10/2019
