Revegetation at our farm – Catriona McLean

It is thought that this massive eucalypt (viminalis/manna gum), is one of the original trees on the Peninsula.  It sits in the original outflow tract of a small creek that winds its way down the Peninsula through Bittern and Balnarring. In its little gully, protected from wind and supplied by water, it has sat perfectly happily and grown massive lateral branches (see above).  It has also escaped the original clearing of the land and chain saws.  Perhaps the outflow of the creek and the gully in which it grows made it hard to get to? Near this tree we found an Aboriginal midden full of sea shells presumably taken from the extensive rock shelves in nearby Western port bay.  How old is this midden? Was this eucalypt alive then?  Did it shelter the original people who lived on the land that we now call our farm. This tree and midden provide a glimpse in to the past.  A past where the indigenous vegetation grew to its natural size perfectly in balance with the local soils and the weather.  This tree inspired me to take a section of our nearby cleared land and start a long, slow process of returning the indigenous trees to this site.  I’ve been revegetating for 14 years in one site and I have just begun another larger area.  I don’t intend on stopping the process of revegetation whilst I can still plant.  As I see it, we are custodians of our land and we must look after it, for the future health of our flora and fauna.

This is the first planting we did in 2001.  Actually John did most of this one. It was planted to protect a broader area from the strong south westerlies so that the next planting could be more sheltered.  We did the planting by-the-book, with each plant given its own surrounding mulch and then a protective shelter.   This area is now home to koalas and many birds.

At the back of the area there is a sand belt. With the help of Dad, we planted a strand of Banksia.   Dad collected the seed from a local banksia and he grew them with a friend of his.  Within Coolart, there are still original banksia strands. Once our banksias started to grow, the spear grass came in and the local salt bush grew as did the local cynoglossus.  With time the Banksias have started to self seed and now there are many tiny banksias.  The bush is now re-creating itself.  Each new self seeded plant is like finding gold (for me at least).

In the original flat paddock, which is now the revegetated area, there was a small dam.  This dam was an extension of a natural lagoon area just upstream from the big gum in the first picture. We, or at least Keith, the best dam digger in the Western Port area, widened this dam 8 years ago along with digging some other ephemeral dams and one deeper one in this area. Our second planting was around this dam on its northeast side.  A pair of black swans is on the dam in this photo.  There are many other waterbirds that also frequent the dam, including my favourite, the little Australian grebe.

We left this path through the plantings on advice of Rowan Cummings, who is also the main provider of our indigenous plants.  Rowan and his co-workers find local seed and grow the plants in tubes.