Getting hot

I cruised around the bushland on Sunday in search of veldgrass, also to mark the location of the fire lit in the bushland in November.

Fortunately the fire was lit in the 'barrens' area so it didn't burn a large area.

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

End of year summary of activities

This is a compilation of our activities for the past 12 months.
FREESIA - hand weeding during winter (Friends of Shenton Bushland)

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LACHENALIA - hand weeding during winter (Friends of Shenton Bushland)

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MISCELLANEOUS
Hand weeded lupins, painted lady, and ixia during winter and spring (Friends of Shenton Bushland)

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Spraying organised by the City of Nedlands

Broadleaf weed spraying (Glyphosate) organised by the City of Nedlands

Black flag spraying (???) organised by the City of Nedlands

FLINDERS RANGES WATTLE
Hand removal by the Friends of Shenton Bushland

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Hand removal organised by the City of Nedlands

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

GERALDTON CARNATION WEED
Hand weeding by the Friends of Shenton Bushland

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Hand weeding organised by the City of Nedlands

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

VELDGRASS - hand weeded during summer

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Veldgrass spraying (Fusilade Forte) organised by the City of Nedlands

WATSONIA - hand weeded during spring (Friends of Shenton Bushland)

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Vetch - hand weeding organised by the City of Nedlands

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Bee hive removal organised by the City of Nedlands

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Recruitment following 'The Storm'

Shenton bushland has looked distinctly bare this year following the storm; the ground cover plants got shredded, and so, much of the ground cover disappeared leaving the soil bare and exposed to weed invasion.
Having been away for the past few weeks, it was most exciting to walk through the bushland on Sunday and discover millions of sedges (Alexgeorgea nitens, Desmocladus flexuosa) and other shrubs coming up despite the very dry winter. Hopefully they will survive the summer.
John and I went around the western section removing veldgrass that survived the spraying.
I also mapped any lomandra that looked like either maratima or hermaphrodites (hard to tell without the flowering spikes) since these are possible hosts for the endangered sun-moth (symenon gratiosa) that we will be looking for again in March.

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

Summer Pattern

It felt very familiar returning to our summer weeding pattern - mainly veldgrass, looking out for the occasional Geraldton Carnation weed that has escaped our attention.

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

Annual Photo Monitoring

Janice Marshall began photo monitoring the bushland in 1994, taking photos in 18 sites around the bushland. We have continued with the monitoring - not every year - but as often as I remember to do so. I did remember to do it this year, and am hoping to find a way to view each of the previous monitoring photos for each site ...

One thing I did notice this year were the unusually prolific grass tree flowering spikes - and the large number of distorted ones. It isn't unusual to find the odd distorted one - but I did find it surprising that there were so many ...

This pair of spikes appear to be dancing with each other ...

This one appears to have tied itself into a knot!

The flowering spikes are the most dominant visual element in the landscape at present. The strange thing is that they don't appear in monitoring photos we have taken in previous years  ... strange.

The photo monitoring sites are shown on the map below.

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

Unexpected encounters with a painted lady

John and I visited the Agave patch, expecting it to be in flower - instead we found painted ladies (Gladiolus angustus) which we embraced with vigour, using our weeding implements to dig them out of the ground (taking care to collect the prolific bulbules they produce). Continuing on with bulbule collection we moved on to the Ixia patch - and found lots there. Our bags became very heavy with soil, so we staggered back to dump our bounty at the bushland entrance.

Long Tubed Painted Lady (Gladiolus angustus) amid an Agave plant

Click here to view live map Click here to download the GPX data for this map. Note, this data is an XML file - change the name to .GPX to upload to your GPS.

Summer in Spring

It feels more like late January than early October - hot, dry, humid - this is going to be a really tough summer for the bushland - after a really tough winter that began with a devastating hail storm, and continued with half of our usual rainfall ...