Category: From Parks Victoria

Grampians NP Community July Update

Tammy Schoo, Team Leader – Visitors and Community Grampians Gariwerd National Park has sent out a comprehensive report to the local community, and I am sure it is of real interest to those of you living further afield.

News in General July 2016
We welcome Ben Thomas to our team in the Role of Grampians Ark Coordinator. Ben brings a wealth of knowledge to the role after holding numerous biodiversity roles with organisations such as DELWP and CVA. The ‘new Ben’ replaces Ben Holmes who has moved to take on a rewilding project in the Little Desert National Park with Conservation Volunteers Australia.

Snow! Yes, we certainly know it’s winter. While it’s not completely uncommon, snow usually falls when the state is at its coldest. The Grampians are certainly very pretty covered in snow and it is a spectacle that many local residents love to see. We do ask that … Read the rest

Meeting at Parks Office with Parks Representatives – 24/06/16

Rod Thompson

On the last Friday in June 2016, FOGG’s members had their annual catch up with Park Management. It was attended by 8 members and 3 rangers, Dave Roberts, Tammy and Ryan.

We were given a basic rundown of the structure of the management of the park, consisting of 2 teams. A park management team which includes Tammy, Ryan, Mark who have all been involved with FOGGs and our activities over the course of the last year. The park team has a total of 14 people under Dave himself. This is complemented by a Fire Management team of 13 staff. The two teams try to work together to manage various impacts, but have to diverge in some areas too. Caity will most likely be continuing in her position as the volunteer coordinator. This is 97% sure but Conservation Volunteers Australia need funding to match Parks Vic. who have funding … Read the rest

From Our Very Busy Ranger In Chief

David Roberts, Area Chief Ranger, Grampians Gariwerd

Over the past 6-8 weeks, there have been many activities undertaken that have been very important to the Grampians National Park now and into the future.

Cleanup Australia Day Week – Grampians Style

A full week of activities was planned and undertaken by over 200+ volunteers, community members and Parks Victoria staff across the Grampians National Park and surrounding Reserves. The intent of the activities was to focus on the high visitor use areas and really promote the right behaviours expected when visitors visit our natural areas. There is a need to reinvigorate the message “leave no Trace” and we’d welcome any opportunity for FoGGS, and other volunteer forums to spread the message through all available forums.

Sallow Wattle “Mechanical Control”

The next phase of our Sallow Wattle control has been underway with the use of a mulching machine grooming semi mature wattle … Read the rest

From the Park Desk Jan 2016

Rainfal DeficienciesUndoubtedly the main talking point around the National Park Office has been how dry the Landscape is, and the implications for us all. Immediately our minds and energies focus on the fire risks to our park and communities which we have had such vivid experiences of over the past 10 years. The dryness is isn’t just a here and now phenomena. We have experienced incredibly dry conditions for the past 3 years which is well illustrated by the diagram.

These conditions not only heighten the Fire risk but also place significant stress on the entire ecological system. Over the past few years, our partners at Deakin University have seen a decline in small mammals across the Grampians landscape as part of their ongoing monitoring into the effects of Fire and now climate has on small mammal populations. It is becoming more and more apparent that rainfall is a key driver … Read the rest

From Our Ranger In Charge

Spring has sprung in the Grampians following a cold but surprising dry period. The Parks Staff have been steadily working on a number of initiatives that are worth updating you on:

  1. Fire recovery projects continue to be rolled out, with works complete and openings occurring at Smiths Mill camp ground and the day visitor site at Hollow Mountain. Both sites bore the full brunt of the Northern Grampians fire in January 2014 and following a period of asset renewal and environmental recovery, the areas are now accessible to visitors once again.
  1. Goat Control. The environmental team have been placing some priority on targeting goats along the Mt Difficult Range, Mt William Range and Black Range State Park. Remote cameras have been deployed along with increased surveillance which targets the shooting program and creates efficiency. The program will continue for the next 4 months.
  1. Asset improvement program. Capital upgrades to Lakeview
… Read the rest

From the Park Desk

David Roberts

I hope all Friends of the Grampians Gariwerd had a wonderful, safe and rewarding Christmas period. The Grampians National Park lived up to its reputation as a great holiday destination with crowds flocking to the area and enjoying the best we can offer. The team here were kept busy servicing the facilities, responding to visitor enquiries, providing customer service and trying to manage the huge crowds particularly through the central corridor.

Over these periods we are fortunate to have 2 additional Rangers join our team to assist in the increased workload. As always, the Grampians have attracted 2 excellent Summer Rangers, Amelia Travers and Matthew White, who are invaluable over the December and January period. They work across the range of our teams functions, provide weekend capacity for customer service and business continuity during periods of extreme weather and bushfires. We thank them in advance for their tireless … Read the rest

From Our Ranger In Charge – David Roberts November 2014

A busy few months in the park as we hit some critical milestones with the fire recovery program, completed some important strategic fuel reduction burns, ramped up the spring fox baiting program and commenced grazer control in the form of removing goats from the Mt Difficult range.

Caitlyn O’Reilly, our conservation volunteer coordinator has hit the ground running and quickly established partnerships and programs in all areas of our business. I can’t overstate how much we value this role and how much potential it has to assist us and communities get good outcomes on park.

The Walking track support group, under the leadership of David Witham have been active with works in and around the Heatherlie Quarry tracks. This site is in store for a spruce up as we invest in new signs and investigate a possible trail realignment.

It is amazing to reflect on the number of groups actively … Read the rest

From the Ranger in Charge Desk July 2014

There is plenty of activity occurring around the park at the moment as we move beyond the shortest day of the year and start the climb towards Spring.  The team has been extremely busy undertaking our routine and not so routine tasks, which continues to challenge our resources and our ability to adequately forward plan. In saying this, the achievements of the team is outstanding when you consider what has been thrown our way this year, on the back of many challenging years.

For the Environment & Heritage team, the key interest has been around planning for the next phase of the Grampians Ark program, our landscape scale predatory control program and ensuring we are being really clear and concise about we are hoping to achieve over the next 3 years. We are hopeful that this initiative will be fully funded by DEPI for that period, and therefore we are … Read the rest

Grampians National Park – An Update – David Roberts April 2014

 

The Grampians National Park has had more than its fair share natural disasters. The recent history is compelling with 3 major landscape scale bushfires in 8 years (2006, 2013, 2014, totalling 87% of the park) as well as record floods and landslides in 2011. In dollar terms, the cost of reinstating destroyed assets over the past 8years is fast approaching $10million, the cost however to our environmental and cultural values is more difficult to measure, and requires specific expertise, short, medium and longer term monitoring to understand the impacts negative and/or positive.

 Any impact in the Grampians from landscape scale events is felt hard by the local tourism industry. Annually, the Grampians National Park directly and indirectly contributes an estimated $400million into the Regional economy of Western Victoria(GT 2014). The Park is one of the most popular tourism destinations outside of Melbourne and the 12 Apostle and … Read the rest

Park Report – Dave Roberts, Ranger in Charge

A wet July and August in the Grampians has restored good flows to our creeks, rivers and wetlands and recharging an otherwise dry system.

Up until this time, park staffs were engaged in trial winter burning operations in the Wannon River heath, an area of the park long unburnt and known to house significant small mammal populations including Long Nose Potoroos & Southern Brown Bandicoots.  The objective of this experimental burning is to introduce fire at small scales into this landscape over a long period of time to help protect the old growth river frontage vegetation from large scale intense fire impacts. The results achieved to date have been mixed which is exactly what we need, some hot, some cool. Prior to the burn we undertook both fauna and flora monitoring to ensure we could assess and interpret the outcomes. It has been interesting to note the amount of diggings … Read the rest

Friends of Grampians Gariwerd