Leap Year Landcare Link-up 2016

Posted on 7 April, 2016 by Asha

Connecting Country’s first Landcare Link-Up for 2016 was very well attended on 29 February, with representatives from 15 local Landcare and Friends groups gathering at Campbells Creek Community Centre. Also present was Peter McRostie from North Central CMA to help with our mapping and Peter Barrow who is the crew leader from the local Green Army team.

Jarrod Coote kicked off the evening with a bit of info about Connecting Country’s on-ground works and also the Stewards for Woodland Birds program. A new guide to revegetation in the local area was also launched. (A new blog post will be released about this new reveg guide soon).

Nicole Howie, our project officer for the Mount Alexander Schools Landcare Day, was our special guest speaker for the night. Nicole spoke about the vision for the Schools Landcare Day and the potential for both Landcare groups and schools to learn and build ongoing relationships. She gave examples of similar successful projects she has worked on in the past, and the kinds of activities we might have on the day. Some ideas suggested by Nicole and Landcarers/Friends at the Link-Up included guided walks, macro-invertebrate surveys, plant identification, soil analysis, bird watching, and a presentation from the Dja Dja Wurrung.

Nicole talking about the Mount Alexander Schools Landcare Day 2016

We also talked about activities that Landcare groups could run at schools in the lead-up to the day, to get kids excited and thinking about their local land. Nicole explained her idea of a mandala collage made from bits of nature, such as leaves and feathers. It was fantastic to see everyone brainstorming great ideas for these activities, and how we can design them with a focus on each school’s local group/s. In the end it will be up to the Landcare groups to decide what they’d like to do, but Nicole and I will send out some guidelines and details of suggested activities soon. If your group would like to be involved in the Schools Landcare Day, it’s not too late to fill out an Expression of Interest!

Landcarers hard at work mapping group areas

Our second half of the evening was dedicated to looking at the boundaries of groups on our network maps. For some, this was relatively easy, but others needed quite a bit of work! Thanks to everyone for your enthusiasm and effort in working through the mapping. Once we have all of the boundaries sorted, they’ll be put into the ArcGIS online map that the CMA uses.

A big thank you to everyone who helped out on the night and made it a wonderful evening! Our next Link-Up will be sometime mid-year 2016.

Asha Bannon (asha@connectingcountry.org.au)
Mount Alexander Region Landcare Facilitator