Kanangra-Boyd to Wyangala Link

Summary from K2W Reference Group Meeting JT Pridham Conference Centre, Cowra Tuesday 17th June 2014

Attendees: Gary Howling (GER, OEH), Gordon Refshauge (Hovell’s Creek Landcare) Gus Arnott (CT LLS), Joanne Lenehan (CT LLS), Melissa Henry (SE LLS), John Rankin (Cowra NRM), Phoebe Cowdery (The CORRIDOR project), Paul Brown ( Council), Ian Eddison (Jenolan/Oberon Landcare), Jules Bros (NPWS- Kanangra Area), Nicola Mason (NPWS), Jo Marshall (Upper Lachlan Shire Councillor, Resident), Nerida Croker (Upper Lachlan Catchment Coordinating Committee Inc, Fullerton Hadley Landcare Group), Mary Bonet (GER, K2W Facilitator)

Apologies: John Asquith (Community Environment Network), Larry Towney (CT LLS), Lori Gould (Greening Australia Capital Region),Michael Vyse (GER, GA) Damon Oliver (OEH), Veronica Doerr (CSIRO) Dylan Gower (The CORRIDOR Project), Jason Neville (NPWS), Greg Stone (Woodlands Environmental Services), Geetha Ortec (NPA), Margaret Hobbs (FNPW), Susannah Bradshaw (FNPW)

Item 1 – General Updates

Opening –Agenda – See Attachment 1 for confirmed agenda attachment 1 - Agenda

Round-table updates from all attendees on general happenings in the K2W landscape  Ian Eddison: Oberon Landcare volunteer since the 80’s and Jenolan over 90’s. Been involved with sycamore infestation. Lithgow/Oberon Landcare also urban issues, Lake Pillars, revegetation, restoration, interpretative signage. Working with Rotary 6 months- planting few thousand trees; writing to local council etc., attending Landcare meetings at regional/state level- providing link in K2W for the Oberon area.  Jo Marshall: Upper Lachlan Shire Councillor/ Bigga resident. Have lodged grants for the Bigga area to assist with feral animal control; goat populations of ferals tripled and there has been a lot of control. Interested in creating a biosecurity area because it’s bordered by Abercrombie and Lachlan. Looking forward to latest round of K2W grants getting out on to the ground, a lot of momentum starting.  Paul Brown- Upper Lachlan Shire – weeds officer; State Government has released framework for biosecurity ACT. Changes to all the rules of noxious weeds ACT, will be out in 2015. Time for change in weed control and LLS.  Nicola Mason: NPWS Katoomba; have dropped off for a bit; so exciting to see all of the things that are happening. Possible carp projects in K2W that would like to discuss. Role is pest management doing the strategic plan; K2W is in the strategic plan.

 Jules Bros: NPWS Ranger at Oberon; involved with lots of parks in K2W. Concentrating on pig program- up and going in July. Have done an aerial cull of Abercrombie caves with Neville Collins, 73 goats and 6 pigs. Doing some camera work through ‘Saving our Species’, for Bossiaea fragrans. Few problems getting landholders on-board. Send out the forms, don’t get many back, really need to do the person to person communication otherwise there is not a lot of understanding of what we are trying to do. Part time Project officer is starting, funded through K2W, they are unable to start until 1st July. Had the Wombeyan Caves Weed Whackers, getting rid of cotoneaster, pines etc. 40 volunteers. Have got some more volunteers working on reveg from the 4WD club. Reveg at Nuggetty. Want to talk about doing some carp bashing; getting some big aerial culls up and running with fast shooters- Mark and Mark, when the new project officer will get the forms signed.  Jo Lenehan: CT LLS: based out of Cowra; working on pest program with Jules targeting pigs on the Abercrombie to protect the spawning sites of the Macquarie Perch. Held a community meeting in April, lots of interest, then not, then yes they would come etc. in the end only one person came. Meeting again tomorrow going to look at offering them sweeteners such as pig traps, cameras. Have consulted David Hunter about program and recommends that we need to get a measure on the environmental measures. Neville, Milton etc. will look at a rapid measure. What damage motivates people to do control- monitor that? Look at how the program works, to gain leverage we need data, need maintenance and how we achieve the knock down. Coordination is the big thing. Hoping that the cameras will stimulate interest etc., and estimate how much damage. Also looking at some GPS collars to determine home range, habitat use and preferences, public/private land use, and be able to obtain this info when it happens. Long term project. Looking for 10-15,000 from K2W to get the job done. Speaking with Jason Michelet from Invasive Animals CRC about hog hoppers versus traps, to be able to poison in paddocks would be advantage. Interested in innovative techniques pig out versus grain.  John Rankin: Cowra Woodland Birds and Cowra NRM; Pleased that he only had a short drive for today’s meeting. CWB focussed mainly in monitoring and evaluation, they have initiated an unground project in the area however have managed to have most of the project management taken over by LLS. With the NRM group have been working with council on noxious weed control and something with exciting potential, a roadside vegetation plan. At this stage it has not been approved however confident that it will be supported and will be important for K2W.  Phoebe Cowdery: project coordinator for The CORRIDOR project; Patrons Cate and Andrew Upton; for cultural pursuits. Been working with local stakeholders and children; currently on a kids go bush- architectural model, 100 kids over 3 days on the notion of shelter. Cowra Council, Cowra Public School, all the schools in the shire are involved and also Canowindra. Currently seeking further funding through FRRR- this will be a pilot. Archikids.  Gordon Refshauge; Landholder and chair of Hovells Creek Landcare also Livestock research officers with DPI. Main focus of HCLG launch of Action Plan on 16th May by Minister Hodgkinson. There were representatives from Local Council, 40 Local Landholders and 12- 16 stalls representing different agencies and groups from the district. The plan has identified that habitat; weeds; ferals and cultural diversity as the major issues. Also fragmentation of the landscape. The group is also running a caring for our country grant focussing on erosion control on about 6 properties, there have been some workshops, some revegetation happening etc. and all going along well.

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 Mark McGaw; SE LLS (former LHPA) getting in to the new organisation, been main focus. Sow seeds with Mel and Gus looking at putting in for projects. Wanting to work with Jules and Jo and Nev, linking everything to the Abercrombie. Could be ground-breaking for that area. Really need to get the landholders on side. Agree that need one on one to get people in particularly as goats aren’t declared.  Mel Henry: SE LLS working out of Boorowa; working on linking connectivity project with Gus, Seen some spectacular country. Landholders have been receptive and open to suggestions. New Landholders seem really keen to be involved in larger scale landscape connectivity; just finalising projects and maps;  Mary; GER K2W, Upper Lachlan Landcare and LFW; since last meeting very busy with Landcare groups finishing off community Landcare projects, Tussock Tamers workshops and events; Fullerton cultural burning; Foggs Crossing, remote camera project and fisheries day. Hovells creek Launch and Aboriginal reference group meeting at CORRIDOR with Victor Steffensen. Have submitted an abstract for the National Landcare Conference (which has been accepted) “How Landcare is contributing to the vision of the GER”. Few more LFW registrations trickling in up to a total of 9. Landcare have been running a caring for our country healthy soils project “healthy soils, healthy people, Healthy communities” and some landscape repair workshops; schools activities and have been, as mentioned by Ian, attending a lot of Landcare meetings, lots of driving and lots of talking, all very exhausting. Some worthwhile others not.  Gus Arnott: CT LLS; Cultural, biodiversity and land management; working projects across the Lachlan. Inspections for EOI’s for the K2W Individual grants taking up most of time at the moment. Noticed that there is a lot more community activity out there than first envisaged, lots of landholder groups who are keen to do stuff. Old groups that want to re- invigorate. Think there are some great opportunities to get this happening.  Nerida Croker; Chair of ULCCC Inc.; attending Landcare forum at Dubbo to meet with LLS Chairs and GM’s also had a meeting with the new South East LLS board at Boorowa. Looking at future funding for Landcare support. With the Fullerton Hadley Landcare group held a traditional burning workshop with Larry, Michelle, Milton and Bill Gammage. There was widespread interest with people coming from the Blue Mountains, Wombeyan and Cowra. Other workshops have been revegetation workshop at John Weatherstones at Gunning; Pest animal workshop with Mark, 2 day property planning and weed management. Fullerton is looking forward to get started on new community grant. Have also put in for weed eradication and pest animal management. Been busy with the Tussock Tamers  Gary Howling; GER OEH, unfortunately had to take unplanned leave which just happened to be at that nutty time of year so it has been very tricky so things have stalled a bit however will be high priority now. One of the big GER events was opportunity to host the Harvey Locke event at Botanic Gardens. For those who don’t know about Harvey Locke he is recognized as a global leader in the field of parks, wilderness and large landscape conservation. He has been highly involved with the Yukon to Yellowstone Initiative and has been in Australia for the Kimberley to Cape York Initiative. He gave a 2hr talk at the Botanic Gardens on connectivity conservation. The event also turned out to be a great opportunity to have the new minister Rob Stokes at what was (likely) his very first speaking event. He gave a very good speech on the importance of national parks etc. We have a video of the event which Mary will circulate.

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ACTION: Mary to circulate a link to the Video from the Harvey Locke Presentation; Attachment: Harvey Locke Presentation link to video

Other activities within the GER Space are two rounds of grant funding through the Environmental Trust; Landcare grants which were to celebrate 25 years of Landcare for Landcare groups within the GER. Closed on Monday and then the GER Partner grants, we will discuss this within the meeting. They will be announced by the minister at the GER Partner forum on 19th August at UTS. The partner forum as mentioned on 19th August. We will need to circulate info about this. We need one or two nominees to attend the workshop in Sydney

ACTION: Mary to circulate info about the GER partner forum Attachment: Details about the forum available here: GER Partner Forum Tuesday 19th August

Q. John Rankin- how is the GER Funding A.Gary- Good until the end of June 15 currently pitching to Government, looking for core funding for facilitators role and key areas - Aboriginal Engagement - Parks of the GER - GER Supporters program - Partners Program - GER Atlas We won’t know anything until November or even as late as next March when the election commitments come in. K2W is however unique, we have funding through the biodiversity fund (all of the other areas have been funded at the State Level) we have funding through till 2017. Whilst there is a mid- project review in 2015 the bulk of the funding will have happened so we are about 18 months ahead and can keep going.

Actions arising from previous meeting

Key Actions: Communications:  Mary - Get together standard Communication Package –  Mary - Talk to councils, RFS about distributing K2W info thru Schools- GER partners- OZ Green- Youth Lead- Bring some of the schools together Have discussed some of the ideas with Tandi (Coms manager for GER) about Coms package. Gary is discussing something at the GER scale with possibility of K2W as a pilot. Organised video for the Hovells Creek Launch, still in draft, have been sending out email updates to growing database, blog, Facebook, twitter, LinkedIn, some media, NPA camera, LFW and VCA’s in local paper, WIRES newsletter. The two grants (individual and community) were advertised to all Councils in their meeting minutes and local newsletters. Some paid advertising and editorial. Have been actively involving schools in activities (will discuss in community grants) ACTION Further Actions: need to develop comms package further. Contact all Councils and arrange K2W presentation, media release to announce successful grants.

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Grants  Discuss with Pest animal working group need for community coordinator once full map of pest animal projects are in. There has been some discussion about this. Still waiting for full map of projects.

Community Landcare Grants  Keith will advise group of date of Hovells Creek K2W Action plan launch. Keith sent this through (as discussed by G. Refshauge)

Conservation Agreements:  Mary & Gus - send details of property through to Kate Smillie when we have the details. Yes, contacted the selling agent, Col Medway, the property had gone off the market as the owner was considering doing a subdivision. Sent through details to NCT who seemed pleased with the suggestion (property details attached) Eurimba • Gary- get a map of existing VCA’s, from Greg Stone Have got this organised. Hoping to discuss VCA’s and lack of interest thus far. How we can stimulate more interest. Hoping to meet up with Greg Stone in Goulburn in coming week to discuss. Gus- yes happy to meet with Greg, wondering whether we could re-iterate the opportunities to participate by sending information out with the contracts when they go out. Whilst this may not create a huge demand it may be another little "tap on the shoulder' for landholders that these are available and can offer benefits to the land mangers if involved. Jules- did we directly target the conservation agreement holders about the grants? I don’t think that some of the ones that I know got details about the grants. Gary- yes should have gone out to all those with conservation agreements. Mary- definitely went to all LFW properties Mary- do you think we offer EOI for VCA properties etc. over a longer period of time, perhaps timeframe under EOI was too short Gary- no it wasn’t too short it was 6 weeks. Mary- what about if we had a register for VCA properties that wanted to do works to assist their management went on a list and then when new opportunities not just through K2W but others such as Quoll habitat funding etc. that are out there then we could recommend. Jules- seems to be lots of grants out there that I don’t know about.

ACTION: Mary to send out list of available grants for community groups and those with VCA’s Attachment: List of community group grants

Item 2: K2W Delivery Activities

K2W Link Connectivity Conservation Grants – Gus Arnott  Well wasn’t looking all that great around original closing date (14th March) after extending till 31st March we seemed to get a fresh flush of EOI’s. Went from about 20 to 58. With reveg, weed control and cultural.  40 out of 42 inspections have been completed still 2 to go, one having surgery the other one hard to contact.  Landholders have really taken on board the project. A lot of linkage projects – corridors, paddock trees and clusters.

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 Biological and chemical weed control influencing pressure to do more control, how they can work with other community members to take ownership.  A lot more projects on the southern side- , Peelwood, Fullerton (also one of the main target areas).  Some cultural heritage and site survey work.  All in all pretty good, went from undersubscribed to oversubscribed.  Mapping up last ones.  Have already run the preliminary ones past the panel- Foundation, GER, Landcare, NPWS and LLS. Good to see that they are meeting the intent of the project.  Will be able to finalise everything after tomorrow. Realise that it has dragged on but will be worth it. Gary- Thanks to Gus and Mel Mary- would like to mention that I have had a lot of very positive feedback from Landholders about experience with Gus and Mel, how helpful they have been and good at communicating what the project is about and open to ideas etc.

2.2 Final wrap-up of Landcare Grants projects - various

Paul Brown- Tussock Tamers Since the last K 2 W reference group meeting the Tussock Tamers project have held a partners meeting on 6 May at Crookwell. The partners in this project include South East LLS, Upper Lachlan Shire Council, Upper Lachlan Landcare, DPI, Contractors and Landholder representatives. Actions and discussions from this meeting included:  Flyers 1, 2 and 3 to be printed ASAP, with the three to be distributed in mail boxes within the Upper Lachlan Landcare area and beyond outlining weed control information and availability for landholders to attend workshops. (see flyer in handouts) Information stand at the Crookwell Show in February; and Potato and pumpkin Festivals in March and May; and at the Hovells creek launch and Brew n Bake in May.  Promotion via Facebook, twitter, and advertising in local paper  Workshops now completed at Reid’s Flat, Crooked Corner, Peelwood, Taralga and Big Hill with still to happen on 22nd June. (Don’t have final figures but looking at reaching 60 -80 Land managers) will be able to create map of most of the properties of participants when complete. And prize draw for those who have attended workshops.  Weed information dinner to be held on 26th June at Crookwell Services Club, Paul Brown ULSC, Mich Michelmore NSW DPI and Chris Houghton Agricultural Consultant to speak on biosecurity and new legislation, info evening aimed at the big end of town/major producers.  Two Paddock Plant field days to be arranged, preferably the first two Saturdays in September, one at or Grabben Gullen and the other at Roslyn. Pre purchase plant folders so that the major expenses covered.  Prize Draw to be on 1 October at a time and place to be decided. Lottery conditions to be on web site.  Dr Sonia Graham from The University of Melbourne will undertake research on successful community groups undertaking weed action and will be conducting interviews in July into how the Tussock Tamers project works.  Next meeting tentatively 7 Aug, 0930 at Crookwell.

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Discussion  Discussion of different weed control issues facing landholders in the Abercrombie area, e.g. “intractable” serrated tussock and revegetation a real option for the management of ST in this area.  Effectiveness of granular. Jules getting good results in parks from granular. Residual for 2 years means that it gets all the babies as well. Only prob Expensive. Dependant on rain. Only one helicopter that can spread. Nerida just been to trial sites at Bannaby. Seem to be getting some good results  Could the economics of the problem be linked to other Federal projects such as carbon capture or other projects? How can K2W piggyback with federal programs, carbon capture etc.?  costs of S.T Control – group to look at federal funding for permanent solutions  Is it possible to see if the weed situation is changing? Is there any modelling to see if the Tussock Tamers program is actually impacting on weed control?  Upper Lachlan has some mapping from 2000 showing Serrated Tussock infestation in the Upper Lachlan Catchment. Could get map updated to see if there are changes, although I am sure that S.T has increased.  Gary- have had some thoughts on this; as we are planning a contingency fund for pest management should we be looking at something for weeds.  Need a methodology for mapping weed management control  Set up bucket of funding for continuous treatment.  Look at individual grants- reveg associated with weed management.  Jules- could also look at pest management  Integration pest and weed.

Fullerton Hadley Landcare- Nerida Croker Have already touched on this in the opening discussion, the project is now completed after final workshop in April – Burning for pasture, culture and biodiversity. This was a great workshop to complete the series of workshops that we undertook over the past 10 months (as mentioned at last meeting). Workshop had over 45 attendees including Gary and Tandi from GER and Geetha from NPA. Guest speakers included Bill Gammage, Milton, Larry and Michelle from Central Tablelands LLS. Plans to take this further in the next community grant application.

Hovells Creek Landcare- Gordon Refshauge Have already spoken about this earlier and Keith has gone over the project in the last meeting. Had some good media coverage from the event. Great to get the minister to the launch and amazed at how long she stayed and mingled, generally at these things she is there for about 5 minutes if you are lucky but she stayed on over 2 hours.

Actions: Gordon to email Mary newspaper article about the launch. Mary to send Gordon the draft of the video for comment and then to circulate link to video of launch when final.

Grabine/Foggs Crossing Landcare- Mary Sean reported on activities at last meeting. Since meeting have completed final two activities, a camera workshop with NPA “who’s living on my land” which had a very good turnout and uptake 7

on cameras. Also they held an information session with Scott Nichols from Fisheries about fish friendly dams etc. So this project is now complete and will be sending invoice to OEH for 5,000

Taralga Landcare- Mary Have spoken with Chairperson Brian Maloney. They have completed their project which included trial into species selection for reveg projects and some filling in the gaps where reveg projects needed supplementary planting etc.

Schools Landcare – Mary This project was aimed originally as a scoping project to run a Frog Dreaming style kids conference which is run in New England area. There was also idea of looking into GER partner, OZ Green which run Youth Lead and Youth Leading the GER. It was decided that the first step would be to start making some connections with the schools and establish relationship and determine what they are interested in and what they are already involved in and what other agencies etc. are offering to the schools (such as the kids teaching kids) which Cattie Guise is involved in. So we have run a few programs and assisted with ones that the schools have already been doing. Working with Greening Australia and LHPA. Tree planting days; bird monitoring at school reveg sites; helping establish and re-establish school plant nurseries; assisting the schools with the art 4 agriculture program (have 3 schools involved with this including the local high school). Encouraging local schools to attend the Kids Teaching Kids Conference at one of our K2W schools on the other side- Neville. (13th August) Would be good to get one to do a presentation on K2W. We also looked at running the canoe trip and modifying for school groups (as discussed at last meeting). Coming up we have got some schools involved in frog watch, and have a meeting this Friday with Adam Shipp Indigenous officer with GA Capital and Binda Public School about setting up Bush Food Garden. As far as running the conference- very interested to hear more about what Phoebe was discussing earlier with the ArchiKids, also possibility of bioblitz. Have started to get a group together to work through possibilities, Nikki Taws and Lori Gould from Greening Australia are very keen to get involved.

Second round of community group project EoIs – Mary Bonet- Gary Howling

We sent out the draft guidelines for the second round of community group funding with the notes from the Bigga Meeting in April asking for comments from the group by the 30th April. (Thankyou to those who provided feedback. We then launched the grants package in early May with the new EOI brochures being delivered on 12th May just in time for the Hovells creek Launch. GER K2W made available 100K for community groups to protect and restore natural connections for native species in the Kanangra-Boyd to Wyangala Link landscape corridor.

Funding of up to $20,000 per grant is available for:  Community field days, information workshops or group events intended to demonstrate local techniques in revegetation, invasive species management (feral animals or weeds) or fire management  Collaborative community planning to plan corridor projects involving two (2) or more adjoining properties

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 Mapping and collation or display of local knowledge on Aboriginal cultural heritage values, including property planning to evaluate future cultural heritage restoration projects  Expansion of an existing habitat restoration, or revegetation project in areas adjacent to a national park, other public reserves or covenanted conservation area on private land  Community monitoring of biodiversity values, threats of outcomes from K2W Link projects The applications closed on 2nd June We advertised through the Landcare groups, our email data base, at events (such as Hovells Creek Launch, Crookwell festival, Landcare forum), in local papers and newsletters. We received 14 applications which include Cowra, Orange, Neville, through to Kanangra Boyd. Not just Landcare Groups, Aboriginal Land Councils and other community groups and clubs. The round was oversubscribed, and in the end we were able to support: • 4 Landcare groups • 3 Aboriginal projects (including Orange and Pejar LALCS) • 3 NGO projects (including NPA and GA)

Attachment : K2W Community grants- successful projects 2014 Also confirming – Upper Lachlan Landcare have agreed another year of hosting Mary as facilitator. She will be on board for 3 days a week, while an NPWS pest management projects officer commences work 2.5 days per week from next Tuesday (1 July).

With around 50 landholder grants in the mix for final decisions next Tuesday on funding through the Foundation (total of $500,000 available from 2013-14), $200,000 investment in invasive species works and $85,000 for cultural heritage, it is looking like 2014-15 will be a very active year in K2W!

I must say that the breadth of activity in the K2W is in large part down to Mary and the enthusiasm and energy of the community on the ground there – thankyou Mary, great work! After Gary returned we set up a panel to rank the applications. There are 9 successful projects, 4 are from Landcare, 3 NGO’s and 2 LALCs. Have started sending out the agreements to the successful groups.

ACTION:. Mary/Gary get a media release together (similar to last year) about the successful projects. Thoughts: : Possibility that the next K2W forum could be a showcase for the community projects Phoebe: have a great idea to do this, called Pechukucha a presentation style in which 20 slides are shown for 20 seconds each (six minutes and 40 seconds in total) it keeps things moving and entertaining. Nicky: yes it’s a great idea, perhaps could make it a requirement to the funding offer that they need to come to the forum and present or do some further communication of their project.

2.4 Cultural heritage – Phoebe Gower

Group have been meeting since September last year. Working on range of things. Held a meeting at CORRIDOR on 17th May in conjunction with Victor Steffensen (from Cape York) visit. There was also a talk about traditional burning happening in Cowra with the council which some of the group went along to after. Had a good discussion about the project and some of the possibilities. Attendees included; Steve Taylor (local Wiradjiri) Larry, Gus, Dylan, Milton, Michelle, some Hovells Creek Landcare, Upper Lachlan Landcare, and some visiting and local artists. The meeting was 9

informal to discuss some of the projects that the group have been developing ideas for the last few meetings about reconnecting to country and finding out what cultural and ecological knowledge is out there, some seed collection projects, working on country, follow on to the canoe trip, the calendar (astronomy) and the further development of the traditional burning. We are also looking at the possibility of using arts and the performing arts to document the story of what we are doing with the traditional burning. Have applied to the Australia Council for Arts NSW and Regional Arts NSW for funding. Want to engage Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists to capture and document traditional ecological knowledge and cultural values. Important to get the right type of artists, so far we have printmakers, sculptors, photographers, ceramists and experimental artists. Get all of the work together and have an exhibition. Have been in touch with Alicia Lonsdale from Arts out West, Aboriginal Education Officer from Bathurst. She is keen to be involved as both an artist and a facilitator. Looking at new career, mid-career and established career artists, this is important so that this body of work will be taken very seriously. Larry also discussed the canoe trip and setting up an education walk at the corridor and Steve Taylor suggested the idea that a Corroborree later in the year.

Mary: As part of the Cultural Heritage working group we are sending 6 people to Cape York to attend a week long Traditional Burning workshop. This has been organised by Central Tablelands LLS. I think there are 30 people going all together which are from a range of different organisations, LLS, Orange LALC, LachLandcare. We sent out an EOI to Aboriginal Community groups and others who are interested in traditional burning. Pejar LALC nominated Luke Burgess however he was unable to get the time away. From those we have selected 2 people from Blue Mountains; Sharon Riley Aboriginal Heritage Conservation Officer Blue Mountains Region NPWS and Diane MacNaboe from Lithgow, Anne Mitchell from Fullerton Hadley Landcare; Steve Taylor from Cowra and both Gary and I were going to attend. Gary has decided that he is unable to take the time off after having unplanned leave last month so has offered his ticket to Phoebe Cowdery. Phoebe will get back to us if she is able to attend. Actions: Mary to send Itinerary etc. about Cape York trip to Phoebe Cowdery and confirm with Michelle if it will be ok to change ticket from Gary to Phoebe. Phoebe will confirm if she is able to attend by end of week.

Attachment: Cape York Itinerary

2.5 Pest animal management – Jules Bros

Attachment: K2W Invasive species management Investment 2013-2017draft: (attachment)

Jo and I have already mentioned what’s been happening and what we are waiting to happen. Pigs in the Retreat River, Aerial Culls in areas; haven’t had an invasive species working group meeting for a while. (Last meeting end of Feb) Have a project officer starting 1st July 2 days a week Discussion: Gus: From the Individual grants we have a good spread of groups. Pigs seem to be the big issue 6 or 7 groups looking at working together. Jo: Need to connect with the Oberon Pig Group; Jules will get details. Nerida: would be good to spread the funding to the bordering areas working outside where the LLS and NPWS are working

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Gus: Will be able to map up the groups Ian: would like to comment that it’s great to see all the different agencies here. Parks LLS working with Landcare. Feels like the councils and State Forests have been not involved and listening to landcarers in the east they are major landmanangers. Is there a way of getting state forests involved? Gary: This issue has been raised a few times; could we bring them into the working group? Jules” problem because they don’t have the resources with Macquarie Forestry it’s all down to one person, there doesn’t seem to be the capacity Gus: is there something we can do on a bigger scale to bring them in. ACTION: Contact details for Oberon Pig Group- Jules will get details Schedule Invasive Species Group meeting- Jules will organise a date when new project officer starts.

Item 3: Research Report

3.1: ‘Who’s living on My Land?’ – Geetha Orthac Geetha was unable to attend today however she has sent through her report from the first “who’s Living on my Land?” project which was with Fullerton Hadley Landcare which I have put in with the meeting notes. We will get here to present this report and the report from Bigga at the next meeting. NPA put in an application to run another program in K2W which has been approved so Geetha will be running more workshops in the coming months. One coming up with the Peelwood group in July.

Item 4: GER Partner Grants Project Funding Proposal

4.1 Scope of guidelines

Background; GER and Foundation for National Parks established this program with funding from Environmental Trust. There is $350 available. Projects need to contribute to one or more of the GER objectives: 1. Connect landscapes and ecosystems- improve the connectivity, condition and resilience of landscapes and ecosystems and halt further decline and species loss 2. Linking landscapes and people- people working together in locally organised and managed regional partnerships to improve the connectedness and resilience of landscapes 3. Communicate effectively- improve the transfer of knowledge, skills and practices through community engagement, involvement and education Apply knowledge- improve understanding of species, ecosystems and local landscape and their requirements for long term health. To be eligible must be a GER partner which includes major partners (on website) and the regional Landscapes such as K2W. Can apply for grants between 20-50k. Agreement with Foundation for National Parks. Need to be in by 30th June. They are looking for things which have maximum return on investment, something like 3-1 or even 4-1. They are interested in alternative concept/actions, activities which are generally unfundable.

4.2 Develop project ideas 11

After discussion that have been had today, Ideas that have already been floated. Integrated Pest and weed management, something where we can bring in Councils and State Forests. Landholder based monitoring; getting a cross tenure measurement for pest and weeds. Building on from Tussock Tamers and who’s living on my land. Field days; get some action happening on the ground. Gordon: looking at what motivates landholders to take action and what are the barriers against taking action on pest and weeds. Gus: Councils have expressed interest in working on some collaborative weed management. Could work something up with them and put in a submission. Gary: Can only be one submission per partnership so would be best if could work on something together. Paul: Will have a chat with councils and see what they are interested in getting involved. Gary: Suggest set up a meeting to put a proposal together.

4.3 Agree host/applicant organisation

OEH could be the host organisation unless one of the other partners want to take it on?

Action: Mary to organise a phone link up on Friday 20th June at 3.30pm with John, Gus, Jo, Jules, Paul, Gordon and Mary. Mary to email Rob Dunn with final proposal NB:Application submitted on 30th June with Host Organisation NPWS copy of application here:

Attachment: GER Grants Program.

Item 5: Next Meeting

Look at organising next meeting about 3 months’ time- somewhere around 17th September. On the agenda.

Report back from GER Forum Communications Activity Mapping existing projects GER Atlas Forum World Parks Congress

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Contact – Mary Bonet (0459 352 892 or [email protected]

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