Biorch plantations blog - Biorich plantations – mimicking nature to integrate conservation & production

Early summer bird survey for ImLal in 2022

23/12/2022

A little windy but we still averaged over 30 species – 31 to be exact. Highlights were an sacred kingfisher and a breeding pair of pallid cuckoos. No noisy miners, which must constitute another highlight.

Made an early start of 8am. Very wet underfoot after weeks of incessant rain. Only three of us – Grant Palmer from Federation University, Louise Humble from BirdLife Ballarat and myself from BRT.

Amazing plant growth – particularly noticeable on the banksias as well as the callitris and hakea on top of the hill. Three of the sequoia survive in ImLal North and two of them look like they may outstrip the roo attacks and grow to maturity. The weeds are of course not being left behind. Gorse and blackberries threaten to overwhelm in places.

Tanya back for 2021 spring bird survey – 33 species recorded

18/10/2021

Tanya Loos (on right) with BRT President, Gary Featherston.

Seven of us took part in the spring bird survey led by ornithologist Tanya Loos. As enthusiastic and competent as ever.
It was a still cloudy day with a couple of serious birders joining us. While only 33 species were recorded, these were present in large numbers, such as sighting of seven or more yellow faced honeyeaters – the first-ever species we recorded at ImLal.
The plant growth this year has been truly remarkable, with even the shrubs now towering above us. One pronounced change was the dieback of the silver wattle, under serious attack from a mite.
It's been a very wet spring and there was a lot of water laying about.

Silver wattle dieback.

A record 46 species seen on the 2020 spring bird survey

4/11/2020

Hopes were always high for a very productive spring bird survey at the ImLal Biorich site following the wet winter and pleasant survey conditions on the day, and the small group of birdos were not disappointed – a huge tally of 46 species was recorded along our usual 90-minute circuit! This is an impressive number of species for a single survey – for context, our previous visits in spring and winter 2019, yielded 28 and 22 species respectively.

Firsts for the spring bird survey included a Sacred Kingfisher and a Musk Duck on the dam. We watched a pair of swamp harriers hunting without harm among the Lal Lal Wind Farm turbines. For a full report of the spring bird survey by leader Grant Palmer, visit the menu for the Bird Survey.

Wattle and gorse out for spring 2019 bird survey – windy and only 28 species

8/10/2019

Boobook seen on roost in plantation

12/9/2017

The boobook owl was seen flying out from a roost on a young swamp gum within the biorich plantation on the winter bird survey. That was a first! Phil has previously photographed it in the pines on the edge of the plantation (see below). That's where we've seen it a couple of times in the past.

Gary Featherston, who came on the winter bird survey, is going to lend us a camera to monitor the boobook's roosting site within the biorich plantation. That way we can see if we can claim it as a regular visitor.

Tanya revisits ImLal South and is impressed

26/6/2017

Prickly moses seven years on.

Acacia paradoxa and Tanya.

After three years since she last visited, Tanya and I had a pleasant walk through what have become the avenues of trees and shrubs on ImLal South. She was impressed by the growth rate. The trees and shrubs are really ameliorating the wind, creating calm pockets. It was a cold, windy day, so not a lot of birds around – just the usual suspects of wrens, thornbills, white-eared honeyeaters, wattle birds and a grey shrike thrush.

Early summer bird survey

16/12/2015

Only Phil and I ventured forth on the early sumner season bird survey. Swamp harrier and two cormorants were the birds of note for the day. Lots of LBB amongst the shrubs in ImLal South.

Cassinia out in force – even witnessed three impressive clumps in ImLal North (pictured). Also pictured below are the poa grass clumps in ImLal North.

Not much going on in winter on the bird front

31/7/2015

Down to a hard core for the mid-winter bird survey on a bitterly cold (there was flurry of snow!) and windy day. Migrants are all away so only the usuals except for a golden whistler. Magpies are supposedly becoming less common but we sighted 21 of them. Four noisy miners but all in ImLal North, not the centre remnant.

We're at last getting some serious dumps of rain over July. It was soggy around the foot of the hill and in dips on the proposed biolink. Some of the spotted gum on top of the biolink has escaped the ravages of frost (pictured below) as was hoped when we planted 20 or so up there last spring.

Mixed flocks flit about for autumn bird survey

17/4/2015

Mixed flocks of blue wrens and fantails were seen flitting around in dense cover in ImLal South: "As you would expect for autumn," said bird survey leader Grant Palmer. One new first – a New Holland honeyeater. Numbers were down overall. Again, to be expected, said Grant: "The migratory species have all flown south."

We spotted a few 'invaders' like rose hip and the pampas grass (on left below). ImLal North is full of thistles (on right below) and the only birds seen are the large woodland varieties like the eastern and crimson rosellas. On the bright side, only one noisy miner was spotted. None were seen in the summer bird survey. What's going on? Maybe it has something to do with the removal of cattle – the only noisy miner seen was on the boundary where cattle are still grazing. It's only a thought bubble...

ID tagging of plants in plots

18/3/2015

ID tagging of plants within sample plots for monitoring of growth began last week. There are 16 plots for monitoring plant growth rates and mortality on ImLal South. With Singarayer Florentine and Tim Simpson from the landscape restoration course at Federation University, we adapted plastic cattle tags, tieing them to every tree and shrub within eight of the 16 plots.

Each tag includes, written in texta, the plot and plant number as originally mapped four years ago. Also, a code that identifies the plant species. To avoid confusion between plots, different coloured tags were used for each plot.

While one of the plots had 100% of plants still present, a number of plots had been severely affected by frost and by the neigbour's cavalier inter-row slashing. Moreover, all plots now have 'volunteers' present – such as silver wattles, blackwoods and the manna gums spreading from the shelterbelt.