Wildlife boxes coming soon

Nest boxes for a range of species that could do with a helping hand will soon be available.

Nest boxes will be available for:

• Possums
• Gliders
• Bats 
• Birds

Boxes are:

• Designed specifically for each species using best available evidence
• Designed for maximum animal comfort
• A range of materials used including Forestry Steward Council approved 17mm  ecoply, FSC 18mm  marine ply and/or recycled hardwood timber

More details and photos coming soon

Bird orchids

It is late spring here in central Victoria on my 'bush block'. It's been a drier season than usual but not as dry as a lot of eastern Australia. We have had approx 30mm of rain this month. Most of it was a down pour over an hour or so of 22mm. So it is reasonably green.

Unlike many bush blocks in my area I don't graze, burn or slash the forest under-story. Where many people fear leaf litter and plant debris, considering it fuel that may imperil their life if an uncontrolled fire comes through, I see leaf litter and plant debris (bark, twigs and branches) as a vital component of biodiversity. Debris makes habitat and breaks down to create a soil ecosystem that feeds plants and animals and makes everything healthy.

Improving biodiversity with leaf litter

I have some magnificent patches of bird orchids at the moment. Thankfully the local grazers (feral and native) swamp wallabies, grey kangaroos and hares don't find them delicious.

Bird Orchid Chiloglottis valida

Taller Bird Orchid possibly Chiloglottis trapeziformis

Since 1970 humanity has wiped out 60% of mammals birds reptiles and fish.
(Living Planet Report - WWF)

I'm guardian to 6 acres of reasonably high quality forest. It really doesn't take a lot of effort to do no harm. My recipe:

• I only use a small portion of it for my own home, garden and livestock (5 chickens).
• Slow down water that moves across the landscape, this replenishes soil moisture and avoids erosion. I do this with earth barriers or logs and debri.
• Allow habitat corridors so that animals can move freely across the landscape.
• Leave lots of logs and fallen branches to become homes for bugs and other larger creatures
• Be a good host. Provide water bowls for birds. Don't use barb wire fences that bats, possums, kangaroos and wallabies can get entangled in.
• Avoid using pesticides and herbicides that can impact through the ecosystem in damaging ways.

I have about 12 very old trees, I'd guess 100- 200 years old that are full of hollows used by a variety of animals. The noisiest and most notable are sulphur crested cockatoos, corellas, kookaburra, possums and ducks. These trees are mostly in decline with replacements still 50-150 years away.

Some other lovely things...

Native Bluebell Wahlenbergia sp

Flowering native Milkmaid lilies Burchardia sp

(Tooth) Paste Waste

Alot of products have an MO (modus operandi ) of convincing us they have a solution to our problems. Often they invent the problem to begin with... looking at you bottled water industry.

Toothpaste.... I've always used it habitually... but I'm fed up with the packaging which includes a cardboard box,  a plastic tube and a lid which always goes into landfill. I brush twice a day EVERY day. Thats alot of paste waste.

So after researching alternatives to tooth paste I realised I dont need a paste substitute, I need to stop using paste! Brushing does a great job on its own. So if you can't make me a product that doesn't harm the environment  I don't want it.

Reflections from Indonesia

Im back in Bali. Im here mostly to see my Mum but its always interesting to observe environments different to home. I'm prone to do more self reflection when away from my home and daily habits.

I use this blog to explore and consider environmental issues. Within the hierachy of structural forces causing suffering, injustice and destruction to living beings, including sexism, racism, homophobia and other structures of oppression it is how humans are destroying the natural world that pains me enormously. The natural world can not fight back against bull dozers, chainsaws, murder, poison, pollution and garbage.

For reasons mostly to do with privacy i dont tend to talk about other things i feel passionate about or are personal... have tried to avoid this being a confessional. I cringe at the thought of over sharing.... but here goes any way.

I recently came across the blog of Elissa Altman titled Poor mans feast. Its an absorbing beautifully articulate series of stories about her life. I particulary like the way she writes about her deep love for her family especially her female partner. Shes not shy in her breadth of topics.

If  I was a writer id like to imagine I'd write with her emotional intelligence... i have a title. ...Lessons my mother never taught me' inspired by the reality that so much of what i know about life, relationships and myself has come from the agonisingly slow processes of the succeses and mistakes of my lived life.
At 50 I feel the tick tock of time ringing louder and I have much that i want to experience.

So back to the main theme of the environment. I  went to Gilli Meno again this year. T calls it Gilli Nemo because in part she loves to be silly and she knows i go to snorkel and gawk at the many fishes. My Mum has the adorable habit of calling it the Gillian Islands. Shes really is speaking 'double dutch'. Gilli means island in Indonesia so shes in essence saying island island.

With my feet up at Gilli Meno

To my great surprise things are changing regarding plastic rubbish. It seems the Balanese have stopped blaming the Javanese and vice versa for the problem. Locals everywhere have activated and are doing regular cleanups. While erosion is eating into the eatern side of the island the absence of plastic rubbish is heartening.

There are more bins around and the mesh contains the contents better

Drinking bottles as rubbish bins and building material

To reduce the number of water bottles, many warrungs offer to refill bottles with drinking water from the 10 litre reusable bottles.

Another solution of sorts was to use them as mini bins for other smaller pieces of plastic rubbish. My friend at the warrung explained that when full, they will be used to build a temple. Now to me that is devine!

My favorite use of plastic bottles is in the construction of hot houses. Using rubbish for functional structures is in my opinion obvious.

Hyacinth Orchids

I always find it extraordinary that as summer entrenches itself and the ground dries and hardens, and the leaf litter and debris crackles, up pops the Hyacinth Orchid Dipodium sp.

Hyacinth orchid

There are many different microclimates on my 6 acre dry sclerophyll forest site. Moist gullies, some grassy open forest and the dry north facing ridge slope. This last one is where the orchids are thriving at the moment. My drive way is lined by orchids at the moment, I see a delightful avenue of them as I drive in and out.

Driveway on northfacing dry forest slope

Most years the emerging shoots are nipped off by something. Probably Swamp wallabies and maybe Hares. The nips usually kill them but these have survived. These are near a wallaby track that crosses the road.

Pruned orchid with few flowers

Maybe we have a shortage of Wallabies or Hares and thus an abundance of orchids. It's always so hard to know what causes an observation.

There are the dark stemmed

And the light stemmed.

What I find fascinating is that these plants are saprophytic, which means that because they don't have  chlorophyll  they live symbiotically with a nearby Eucalyptus tree/s via mycorrhizal fungi. Very clever. They can not be cultivated. I can't tell you how extraordinary and reassuring I find it that there are some things humans can't manipulate.

Oceans of plastic

I have always been aware of the dangers of plastic to our natural world. I think most people dont think its got anything to do with them. But as with most change movements, those with influence and power need to be convinced by the actions of us the ordinary and average citizen.

I'm in Bali at the moment. It is never far from my mind and observation that we humans consume and pollute every where we go. Disposable packaging on the flight was every where. The prewrapped blanket, headphones gave way to the supplied lunch with sachets for this and that.

Where I'm staying the ubiquitous plastic bottles for drinking water are absent. The room has this nifty reusable 10 litre water vessel that sits on dispenser, providing hot and cold water.

The owners have also taken a position on A/C that is refreshing. People are billed for the power used to run the air conditioning. It means people dont leave it running unnecessarily.

I have lovely Dutch parents.  So I might be biased when it comes to the endeavours of Dutch people.
The Netherlands has an extraordinary history of land modification. Reclaiming land that was once covered in sea water and engineering the landscape so that it drains allowing for vast areas of food production. The dutch are in the fortunate position to have engineering solutions for global warming symptoms like extreme weather events and rising sea levels.

One Dutch man who has his sights further a field than Holland is Boyan Slat his campaign to clean up the plastic accumulating in the oceans is inspiring. Have a look at The ocean cleanup page and if you can contribute to their project.

Co2 levels and vegetation growth

On my bush block dominated by Eucalyptus trees, the canopies look the best I can ever remember. They are full of large glossy new leaves.

We had a very wet winter and spring, so much so that when we buried our cat, the hole that we dug, approx 60 cm down had very damp clay, and that was in the middle of summer. I think its fair to say that water plus CO2 allows plants to grow faster.

But nothing is ever straight forward. Im no scientist but am a very keen observer of my environment.
Im very curious about how the ever increasing levels of CO2 are contributing to vegetation growth.

An ABC report from 2010 talked about some negative side effects from increased vegetation growth as a result of increased atmospheric CO2.

• Some plants increase that amount of toxins in their leaves to reduce palatability
• Other plants reduce the amount of proteins in the leaves

For native fauna who rely on already fairly impoverished vegetation especially Koalas this might have really negative consequences.