Category: 2018 Summer Newsletter

From the Editor

Welcome to our slightly late April newsletter. Some of you shouldn’t be receiving it because you are unfinancial but we have decided to be kind and give you a last free copy. Please fix before the New Year starts. Not sure? Contact our treasurer Judith on 53836247.

Unable to get to any of our activities but would like to help us? We welcome contributions from members- articles, poems, memories, art, photos …. This is your newsletter.

Last issue I mentioned the rising number of tourists and the official numbers have just been announced.  In 2017 Grampians received over 53,000 international overnight visitors – up 3.5% on the YE 16 and visitors stayed 352,200 nights in our region – up 22.9% on YE 16.

And finally do remember we have a website, administered by our very reliable Frank van der Peet down in Apollo Bay. This newsletter will shortly be up … Read the rest

From the Editor

Welcome to our summer newsletter.

Please note that our first activity for the year is on February 24th at 4pm in the Mural Room in the Parks Office at Brambuk. Hear about the research done by two of our members Ben Gunn and Bill Gardner.

Then on Saturday March 3 we are having our annual cleanup activity followed by a BBQ lunch. Because a replacement for Caity has not yet been appointed we have been asked to take on more responsibility. If you are able to help please contact us asap so we can work out sites and activities. See below.

April 13 Friday at 5pm Mike Stevens will catch us up to date on what is happening re environmental issues in our park. Some of us will then be heading to Cavendish’s Red Gum Festival the next morning to put up a display on the history of our Red … Read the rest

2018 February Prez Sez

Hello foggies and welcome to 2018!

We are kicking off another year and I hope it can be an impressive one. As always we will be doing a cleanup day this year in March, and I hope we can see some PhD presentations from some of our esteemed membership. A working bee or two, some educational sessions too. A picnic on the mount… no wait wrong song! Our usual mix, sprinkled with some time outdoors enjoying the park.

Online stuff- this may be a year of technology for FOGGs.

Parks Victoria have launched a website called ParkConnect, to help people find and join volunteer groups and organisations. The idea being it will allow people new to an area, or travelling through to find a local group or activity to be part of. Three members of our committee attended a workshop to learn its operation, from the team that developed the … Read the rest

From the Parks Desk

It has been a busy summer holiday period in Grampians National Park. According to the latest figures the Halls Gap area saw a 1774% increase in population – from 316 permanent residents to a peak of 5500 people! This was the largest percentage increase across the state of Victoria and evident by the sheer volume of people visiting the national park.
However, the impact on the park has been both positive and negative. It is fantastic seeing so many people out enjoying this landscape, however disappointingly we have noticed an increasing number of people failing to take responsibility for their own rubbish. Please help spread the message of taking your rubbish with you. The photo below was taken by one of our rangers at Silverband Falls Carpark.

STAFF MOVEMENTS: After 3 years in the Grampians as a Volunteer Coordinator and Project Firefighter, Caity O’Reilly has accepted a new marine focused … Read the rest

Feral Cats

News from Mike Stevens

The Victorian Government has indicated it will officially move to declare cats as pest animals on public land in mid-2018 paving the way for feral cat control.

The important next step will involve community engagement to consult on the types of control techniques that will be allowed. Being able to complement large-scale fox 1080 poison baiting with large-scale cat poison baiting could be the next evolution of the Grampians Ark project. Data is indicating that aerial baiting for feral cats is extremely effective during the colder, winter months when natural food resources are scarce and feral cats are under a higher metabolic requirement, thus, less fussy and more willing to eat a bait. It is the type of sophisticated “once-per-year” program the Grampians could deliver, complementing the long-term fox poison baiting efforts.

The Western Quoll reintroduction project in the Flinders Ranges continues to get excellent results … Read the rest

Grasses Day

Leigh Douglas

SEDGES HAVE EDGES
RUSHES ARE ROUND
GRASSES HAVE KNEES (nodes) THAT POINT TO THE GROUND

Amphibromus, Lachnagrostis, Austrostipa, Chloris, Themeda, Neurachne ….. or, Wallaby Grass, Blown Grass, Spear Grass, Windmill Grass, Kangaroo Grass, Fox-tailed Mulga Grass – just some of the native grasses identified by Alan Bedggood at our home near Lake Lonsdale, as he led about 20 of us on a fascinating tour of discovery on our November activity. Ask Alan if you think I’ve got some names wrong …. because it’s quite likely ….. a new learning curve, and definitely a new passion.

Alan brought along samples of grass for us to handle and look at closely, with and without using little powerful illuminated magnifiers for studying the finer points of grasses, such as their awns, lemmas, and glumes, the only way in which to speciate many grasses; the more closely we could look, the more … Read the rest

Mt Difficult Drive and Walk (14 Oct 2017)

Geoff Stratford

As members gathered at the Boroka Lookout mid-morning in mid-October the lookout was shrouded in cloud giving very limited possibility of catching a glimpse of a view. No matter to FOGG’s, a dozen of us pooled vehicles to tackle the gravel road which had claimed a Parks vehicle, bogged, earlier in the week.

With some hastily arranged road repairs by Parks Vic our group encountered no hint of a problem. In fact the amount of interesting plants and interactions between those present meant we travelled only a small distance compared to that which had potentially been planned. Rodney and Margo had mapped out perhaps five to seven locations which we might stop and observe the flora and environment.

Our first stop seemed less than two kilometres along the Mt Difficult track and it became obvious that we were blessed to have the company of Neil Marriot for … Read the rest

Advisory Group Meeting

The AG has met twice since our last newsletter. I missed the meeting at Mckenzie Falls and Zumsteins, but was able to attend the December meeting. (Quick summary: the green (middle) Zumsteins cottage will be well restored, with the western (blue) cottage partially demolished and managed as a ruin. The eastern (orange) cottage has had a protective, replica roof installed. The next state election may have some focus on McKenzie Falls options, particularly the carparking area.)

In December Mike caught us up to date with the dilemmas surrounding what to do with the Brush Tail rock wallabies, particularly in view of the fact that the male is about to begin breeding with his own daughters. DELWP have commissioned a review by Dr Graeme Coulson to be completed in April. The AG preferred option was rather than intervening by removing the older male and disrupting the existing colony, investigate introducing another … Read the rest

Spiders in the Grampians

Did you see the articles in the Age and on ABC on new spider finds in the Grampians? With the exquisite photos by our ranger Dave Handscombe? Here’s part of The Age article…

Peacock spiders, which are only a few millimetres long, have captured the public imagination recently due to their colour and ceremony.
And thanks to a recent discovery, Victorian spider enthusiasts no longer have to go far to find them.

Five species have been discovered in the Grampians, one of which had never been observed in Victoria and one that had never been observed outside Tasmania, making the find quite a coup.

“These spiders, they’ve got to put on a really good display – because if they are not happy with it, the females will go and eat them,” says Grampians park ranger Dave Handscombe, who found the species in October.

Mr Handscombe has worked as a ranger … Read the rest

Red Gum Festival

www.facebook.com/CelebratingRedGums

The Cavendish Community are very excited to be hosting the inaugural Red Gum Festival from the 13th -15th April 2018. As part of the event, they are aiming to provide the local community and visitors with a broad range of red gum and environmental related information, advice, opportunities and the chance to connect with relevant groups and organisations.

They have invited FOGG to participate and we will be contributing something about the history of our Red Gum Walk.… Read the rest