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In this issue BUSH 3 A year at Carnarvon 4 Around your reserves 6 Her bush memory HERITAGE 7 Easter on Boolcoomatta NEWS 8 From the CEO Winter 2012 www.bushheritage.org.au Your wombat refuge The woodlands and saltlands of your Bon Bon Station Reserve are home to the southern hairy-nosed wombat. These endearing creatures have presented reserve manager Glen Norris with a tricky challenge. Lucy Ashley reports Glen Norris has worked as reserve manager – and he has to work out how to do this “It’s important we reduce rabbit in charge of protecting over 200,000 without harming the wombats, or their hectares of sprawling desert, saltlands, precious burrows. populations, and soon,” says wetlands and woodlands at Bon Bon The ultimate digging machine Glen. “Thanks to lots of help Station Reserve in South Australia for two-and-a-half years. Smaller than their cousin the common from Bush Heritage supporters wombat, southern hairy-nosed wombats Right now, he has a tricky situation on his have soft, fluffy fur (even on their nose), since we bought Bon Bon and hands. long sticky-up ears and narrow snouts. de-stocked it, much of the land Glen has to remove a large population of With squat, strongly built bodies and short highly destructive feral rabbits from legs ending in large paws with strong is now in great condition.” underground warren systems that they’re blade-like claws, they are the ultimate currently sharing with a population of marsupial digging machine. Photograph by Steve Parish protected southern hairy-nosed wombats How you’ve help created a refuge for Bon Bon’s wombats and other native animals • Purchase of the former sheep station in 2008 • Removal of sheep and repair of boundary fences to keep neighbour’s stock out • Control of recent summer bushfires • Soil conservation works to reduce erosion • Ongoing management of invasive weeds like buffel grass • Control programs for rabbits, foxes and feral cats. Night, camera, action! To see night-time footage of the wombats around their burrows, captured by Glen’s hidden sensor camera, visit www.bushheritage.org.au/your-wombat-refuge.html. You can also help Glen to keep the wombats safe while fighting feral rabbits by visiting www.bushheritage.org.au/donate. Their burrows range in size from two Bon Bon is pretty much ‘wombat heaven’, What Glen found at metres to more extensive systems of up to or it will be once we deal with the rabbits. 30 metres. They excavate them using the “On Boolcoomatta Reserve, 500 kilometres Bon Bon sharp, flattened digging claws on their from here, we’ve had great success front legs, and push soil and rocks out reducing rabbit numbers by destroying with their back legs. Once they’ve made their warrens and leaving them with 1,781 some headway, they roll onto their sides nowhere to live and breed,” says Glen. and start enlarging the roof and walls. “This will have a fantastic flow-on effect for Number of rabbit warrens Up to ten wombats may share a refuge, native plant regeneration, and increases in but will move between burrows and even the numbers and diversity of native warrens. Males can be territorial, animals the reserve protects.” resorting to nasty biting of the ears, flank “Here, because our wombats rely on their 220 and rump when they want to make a point. burrows as a refuge from heat, we’ll have Number of wombat burrows “It’s hard to say whether the wombats or to proceed really carefully. We’ve just the rabbits were here first,” says Glen. finished mapping the ‘labyrinth’ area, so “But you have to assume it was the we know exactly where the rabbits are in wombats because they’re a local native that part of the reserve, where the species and have probably been here for wombats are and where their burrows 200 million many, many years. Whereas rabbits are actually overlap. Over the next two years Estimated number of feral rabbits introduced pests.” we’ll map the other areas these animals threatening native species in Australia Since their release into the wild by early live on Bon Bon.” European settlers, rabbits have been the So while Bon Bon’s wombats keep digging scourge of the Australian bush, consuming away, Glen will be doing the same vast amounts of native seeds and grasses, – working on the best way of ensuring that and competing with wombats and other these very special native residents remain native animals for vital nutrition. Their safe (and rabbit-free) for many generations grazing has caused widespread damage to to come in their ‘wombat heaven’. the land – resulting in soil erosion and enabling the spread of noxious weeds. Bon Bon Station Reserve was acquired in With your support we’ll be able to face 2008 with the assistance of the Australian the challenges ahead Government’s National Reserve System “Our wombats live in a particularly special program, the Government of South area: a vast 26,000-hectare ephemeral Australia and the Besen Family Foundation. drainage system called ‘the labyrinth’ that Thanks also to The Native Vegetation feeds into a series of freshwater and Council for support of vital conservation saltwater lakes and claypans. It’s really work on Bon Bon this year. pretty country, virtually weed-free and it attracts some amazing native woodland birds, including South Australia’s only endemic species, the chestnut-breasted whiteface. We also expect to find these wombats in the rocky hills in the south west of the property, which is the next area to be surveyed.” 2 www.bushheritage.org.au Thanks for a special year at Carnarvon When the McLean family moved to your Carnarvon Station Reserve twelve months ago, they discovered a very special place – one that thrives thanks to help from Bush Heritage supporters like you. When Bush Heritage reserve field officer, Jo, however, takes the isolation in her Mat McLean first drove onto Carnarvon stride and has sometimes gone ten weeks Station he fell in love. “It’s wild country,” without leaving the reserve. “I think it’s he says. “There are healthy bluegrass exciting!” she says. “You really get to plains rising up to sandstone escarpments appreciate the remoteness and the and all you can hear is the breeze, the beautiful surrounds.” birds and the noise that you make yourself Her favourite pastime is an early-morning – it’s awesome.” jog or walk with the children. “We’ve seen Mat moved to Carnarvon, Central emus out in the flats with their young; Queensland, last June, with his young red-necked wallabies lolling on the grass; family – wife, Jo, and daughters, Annie (4) and we have a resident sugar glider in one and Lucinda (six). They were amazed by of the trees close by.” How you’ve helped protect the vast ranges and rocky escarpments, Protecting Carnarvon’s future which stretch over 60,000 hectares. Carnarvon Though the girls are too young to help Dad “I love the cold, frosty winter mornings, Thousands of Bush Heritage supporters out on the reserve, they are already which turn into beautiful crystal blue days,” generously responded to our call in learning the importance of its long-term says Mat. “Then the moisture and warmth 2011 to help reserve managers like Mat conservation. “They can identify most of summer makes everything bloom!” meet the challenge posed by excessive weed and grass species and will tell you rainfall and floods, bushfires and a A long way home about the impact feral animals have on the cyclone. At Yourka Reserve, 800km to Yet the family have never lived anywhere bush,” says Mat. “They get conservation the north of Carnarvon, you helped to so remote. “We haven’t had a mailman for – why burning’s important and what we, repair roads after Cyclone Yasi hit the eighteen months, and it’s a nine-hour together with all our supporters, are reserve in 2011. round trip to get a loaf of bread,” Mat says. working hard at Bush Heritage to achieve.” This year’s heavy rains at Carnarvon, The area’s also had three exceptionally For Mat, it’s been a privilege to share such however, have continued to create wet years, which makes managing and a wonderful experience with his family. problems and we’re still waiting for dry living on the reserve challenging. “Being together, watching the sun go down weather so we can repair the main over the grass – this year will stay with us access road. Bush Heritage volunteers for the rest of our lives,” he says. have been unable to get onto and around the reserve. “So they can’t help us with vital work like our weed control program,” says Mat. The Channin Creek Jo’s top spots on Carnarvon “The damage done to the roads also Carnarvon has been a special place of “We’ve spent means we can’t access key parts of the discovery for the McLean’s. Here are countless hours reserve to carry out early-season control Jo’s favourite spots on the reserve. swimming, burning.” And since there is so much rock-hopping and The verandah vegetation on the ground after three wet discovering this lookout years, fire management is even more creek, which runs important than usual. But thanks to your “You can see the the length of the property. Previous support, Mat has done the work that will open flats, reserve managers and their families help safeguard Carnarvon against savannah knew it as a dry creek bed, but we’ve destructive wildfire by burning those woodlands and the seen it flowing year-round.” areas of the reserve from a helicopter.

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