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Bush Heritage News Winter 2005 ABN 78 053 639 115 www.bushheritage.org region, which includes the Kalbarri In this issue Our wildflower National Park to the south-west and Eurardy, a new reserve haven, Eurardy, soon the Toolonga Nature Reserve to the north-east. Only an area of unallotted Ethabuka update to be protected crown land remains unprotected Volunteer rangers across this extensive area. Map of Bush Heritage reserves Once again your outstanding Burrin Burrin Reserve generosity will save a special part Our knowledge of Eurardy’s Weeding blitz of Australia.The transfer of Eurardy importance for plants is largely the Station to Bush Heritage should be result of the survey work undertaken approved by the time this reaches by the Wildflower Society of Western Thank you for your contribution. you.This 30 000-hectare property, Australia for the West Australian Without your support, the protection featured in the previous newsletter Herbarium. of this stunning natural ‘garden’ (Bush Heritage News,Autumn 2005), would not have been possible. is in Australia’s Global Biodiversity We are grateful to the society and Hotspot in south-west Western its members for their efforts and Diverse shrubland with blue Dampiera and yellow Glischrocaryon. PHOTO: MARGARET QUICKE Insets from top: Australia and will be our twentieth for providing us with a copy of Grevillea petrophiloides and Cheiranthera filifolia subs reserve. their survey results and a digital simplicifolia. PHOTOS: FROM THE IMAGE LIBRARY SUPPLIED BY THE WILDFLOWER photographic record of many SOCIETY OF WESTERN AUSTRALIA In enabling us to purchase Eurardy of the plants.These will be you have helped to protect some invaluable resources for our future of Australia’s most spectacular management of the reserve. wildflower displays and over 600 plant species, including endangered, With more than half of the property vulnerable and priority species. still to be explored and no formal wildlife surveys yet undertaken, we You have also helped to build anticipate that there will be many more a corridor of reserved land in the exciting discoveries to share with you. 1 A similar feeling of unreality came among them; in just a couple of As the dust settles… from doing the fencing on the months there will be three of us. southern boundary of Ethabuka, the Reserve managers Alastair Dermer reserve’s boundary with Kamaran Much of our time has been consumed and Karen Harrland report on their Downs.We were welding star pickets by renovating the house, constructing first summer at Ethabuka Reserve, on to the top of star pickets in an volunteer quarters for the impending Queensland attempt to maintain a fence above influx of volunteer rangers, and developing a workshop.Throughout It’s been a little over seven months the relentless waves of sand that were trying to reclaim the land. the heat of summer the working day since our arrival at Ethabuka and started between 4.00 and 5.00 am in we are proud to be still standing Camels, once just curious beasts of an attempt to beat the heat and the as the long summer draws to a close. the desert or circus, are now our flies. By 10.30 to 11.00 am, with the As the first permanent Bush Heritage companions and a source of both temperature over 40 0C and a strong, management team we have been amusement and annoyance. For a while dust-laden wind often blowing, we busy establishing the property as through the heat of summer they would turn our attention to tasks a reserve and learning about life would gather around the homestead protected by the house and its in this harsh yet rich environment. after sunset, seeking a drink from our struggling air coolers. tank overflow.Their lack of social Looking back over the past summer graces disrupted our evenings as they we realise how we have evolved from broke wind, belched, bit each other cold-tolerant Tasmanians to heat- and stamped their feet. Our attempts tolerant desert dwellers. Now we get to get them to keep the noise 0 goose bumps in the 21 C mornings down were met with indifference. 0 and think of 37 C as a cool day! Thankfully they will soon be mustered During this transition we have gathered and removed. fond memories and a new perspective on many things.We think with While on the topic of drinking and delight of the evenings spent sitting water, the installation of a reverse on top of the dunes as the last of the osmosis water filter has dramatically Some of the early land management sunset colours and flies disappeared, improved the quality of the drinking tasks have included removing of the stars gradually filling the sky water.The bore water, which was cattle that had wandered in from and of the realisation that, for many once undrinkable, is now delicious. neighbouring properties, repairing kilometres in any direction, we were We have wondered, however, if perhaps kilometres of fencing, establishing the only people. the high mineral load in the water a management strategy for camels, has magical properties. identifying and mapping introduced Te n women in our local plants, and researching the complexities community of only 120 of the arid-zone landscape. people are pregnant and we are 2 Developing networks with our been digging trenches in dunes on neighbours, the local community, the western edge of the property in regional land management authorities their search for marsupial moles. and traditional owners has been an In such ‘perfect mole habitat’ they important activity. were surprised at the absence of mole tunnels.Their next step is to determine During March we were fortunate whether a geographical barrier has to be visited by traditional owners prevented the moles from moving Barbara Dunn and Jean Jacks, elders east from their known locations in of the Pitta Pitta people.They came the western Simpson Desert. with Shaaron Stevenson, the Desert Channels Catchment Coordinator From 19 to 21 April we held our from Longreach.Their visit enabled first management planning workshop. us to explain the aims of Bush Researchers from the University Heritage and initiate a working of Sydney, David Akers from the relationship with the traditional Queensland Parks and Wildlife owners.We visited some of the many Service, representatives from amongst significant cultural sites and artefacts our neighbours, and Bush Heritage on Ethabuka and discussed the staff helped us to confirm and fencing work needed to rehabilitate structure the management priorities Ethabuka Spring. for the reserve.We would like to thank all these people for their support. Your generous donations and support from the Australian Government’s Natural Heritage Trust’s National Reserve System program have protected this property.We now have the privilege of guiding its future as a conservation reserve of international significance.This is an exciting prospect. Perhaps you will be able to visit us Now, as the weather cools and the before too long and see for yourself dust settles, we are enjoying the how you are helping to save one of arrival of visitors from the local the most remarkable areas of Australia. community and volunteers, all of whom are proving to be an invaluable Facing page, clockwise from top: Dawn over the dunes. source of knowledge and expertise. Ethabuka 'homestead'. View over the spinifex Triodia dunefields. Inset: Feral camel. PHOTOS: WAYNE LAWLER/ECOPIX And we are exceedingly grateful for the extra pairs of hands! This page, clockwise from top: Spiny-cheeked honeyeater. Central military dragon. Varied sittella feeding chicks. Others have arrived to undertake Drainage line through the ironstone hills. Rocky ranges rise above the expansive shrublands. PHOTOS: WAYNE LAWLER/ECOPIX research.Alice-Springs-based scientist From left, traditional owners Jean Jacks and Barbara Dunn with Joe Benshemesh and his team have Shaaron Stevenson and Karen Harrland. PHOTO: ALASTAIR DERMER 3 The secret life of a volunteer ranger Joelle Metcalf and Julian Fennessy, come. You will also need a current first the Bush Heritage Conservation aid certificate, but if you don’t have Partners team, talk about the vital one Bush Heritage can help you to importance to the organisation of obtain it. For those of you who do have volunteer rangers special skills – in trades, in anything mechanical or practical, or in ecology Volunteer rangers? Who are they and – we certainly have a job for you. what is their role in Bush Heritage’s management of Australia’s natural Your work as a volunteer ranger may environment? vary from day to day.You might be painting, hammering, sawing, fencing, Put simply, volunteer rangers are pulling weeds, catching feral animals, people like you and me and they digging, spraying, surveying plants are essential to the management of or animals, recording data, mapping, the large Bush Heritage reserves. monitoring or even bulldozing.All At Bush Heritage we depend on these activities are on the agenda at volunteers to assist with the some time as part of the management multitude of tasks required to work needed on the larger reserves. help manage the huge areas of conservation land in our care. Veteran volunteer rangers John and Lyla Hansen, who have worked at both Carnarvon Station and Ethabuka reserves, put it this way: ‘There is a lot to be done on [the reserves] and no volunteer with a spirit for adventure will be disappointed.You will love it as much as we did.’ At the end of the day you can relax with a cold beer or a glass of wine To be a volunteer ranger you do in your hand and watch the sun go not need to have any specific skills down in one of the most spectacular or knowledge or come from a landscapes in Australia.A good meal conservation background.What you amongst friends, sharing the events need is a sense of adventure, a sense of the day, and a comfortable bed of humour, a natural love of the make the experience complete.