Tag: Friends of Tarra Bulga
Ch Ch Ch Changes….
Merry Christmas to all. This site will become bigger and better now as this site will now become Friends of Tarra Bulga National Parks main website, Our VicNet site will be disappearing soon and the information on that such as Newsletters, Walk Information, Park History etc will all be transferred over to here.
Also note the new domain name which is already in operation friendsoftarrabulga.org.au It should make our site nice and easy to find. We also have a new email address friendsoftarrabulga@gmail.com which will be the one for people who want to get in touch with us to contact. Our long serving President Peter is off on an overseas experience for a year so all inquires about the group should now go to David Akers who can be contacted on 0488 035 314.
- Snow in August this year with Rudolph added for a seasonal flavour
Mt Tassie Walk
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Friends of Tarra Bulga National Park are holding another group walk on Saturday November the 9th with the aim of exploring some of the lesser known local tracks. This time we will be heading out of the park and along the Grand Strzelecki Track up the Duff Trail to Mt Tassie. We will meet at the Visitors Centre at 9.30am, ready to walk. Please bring water, appropriate clothing, and lunch/snacks etc. All Welcome.
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Koala Walk, with Dr Kath Handasyde
Dr Kath Handasyde is a senior lecturer in the Department of Zoology at the University of Melbourne and has been conducting research on koalas for over 30 years. She is coming down to Tarra Bulga National Park on Saturday October the 26th to share Koala knowledge with us. The day will begin with a free BBQ lunch at the visitors centre, then we will head down and go for a walk around a new track in the Tarra Valley, to see what we can find. Please note the walk does include some steep and slightly challenging terrain so people need to come prepared with suitable footwear, it will take about 2 hours. Everyone is welcome but please RSVP to Pam on 5196 6140 or Peter 0447 474 573 by Friday October the 18th for catering purposes.
Friends of Tarra Bulga Have a Busy Year
Friends of Tarra Bulga recently held its AGM, where the diverse activities carried out by the group were highlighted. A major activity of the group is to staff the Parks Visitor’s centre, in the past year 29 Volunteers contributed to opening the centre on Weekends and School and Public Holidays (a total of 182 days).
The Friends also have plenty of hands on activities throughout the year aimed at helping to learn more about the park and enhance it. This includes walks along some of the more remote tracks, Lyrebird surveys and working bees involving both weed control and tree planting. The group undertakes photo-monitoring of various sites to monitor vegetation change and has a network of remote cameras that are helping to gain a better picture of what is happening with both native and feral animals in the park. A device that can be left out in the park to record frog, bird and bat calls is a recent acquisition.
To let everyone know what is happening in Tarra Bulga and more about its plants animals and fungi they have a Blog http://www.tarrabulga.wordpress.com which is packed full of photos and information. They are also on Facebook and Twitter and are very keen for the public to share their own Tarra Bulga experience via these sites. You can also find more information about getting involved with the group by contacting the Ranger, Craig Campbell on 5172-2508.
August Working Bee
Friends of Tarra Bulga National Park
Volunteers Wanted
Working Bee: Saturday August 10th
Time: from 10am until Lunchtime.
Task: We will be meeting at the visitors centre and then moving on to a planting site that the group has been rehabilitating. The aim is to plant some new Mountain Ash seedlings as well as to do some maintenance on previous plantings including the removal and re-use of wire mesh guards.
This is the site we are trying to turn back in to tall Wet Forest
Wear/Bring: Boots or Gumboots, Gloves.
Afterwards: Lunchtime bbq provided for the workers.
Register: David Akers on 0488 035 314 or email dakers@activ8.net.au by Wednesday August the 7th.
2013 Lyrebird Survey Report
Less than ideal conditions beckoned for this years count, indeed when I woke up at 5.15 am and heard the rain pelting down on the roof, I fired up the computer and checked the rain radar and saw that it was going to continue to bucket down, (especially at Balook) for the foreseeable future. I put the text through to Ranger Craig, who soon phoned back and told me the decision had been made given the weather to postpone. He said he would go up anyway just in case anyone turned up, and I returned to bed.
Much to my surprise, 2 days later I heard the news, that when Craig arrived at the Visitors Centre there was quite a crowd, who despite the weather were raring to go (much kudos to those hardy souls).
Reports suggest that the inclement weather may have influenced the survey, with several sites unusually recording no calls whatsoever. There were however Lyrebirds around with reports of a group foraging directly in front of the Visitors Centre. Possibly the much needed rain produced ideal conditions for the birds to feed, so inconveniently the boys were more focused on filling their stomachs, rather than attracting the ladies with their fancy calls. Despite the visual sightings, only two male birds within the survey area could be properly counted using our call based technique. Hopefully the drop in numbers can be attributable to the conditions, rather than more sinister reasons such as increased fox numbers. In any case I am sure we will be back next year with hopefully more favourable conditions to do it all again. I also hope that despite the conditions that the hardy survey team had a great morning and the usual scrumptious breakfast at the guest house.
PS. To any of the attendees that braved the conditions and got a good photo of any aspect of the morning, it would be great if you could forward it on, so we could add it to this report.
Friends of Tarra-Bulga National Park 