FOR MANY years in Landcare there has been an emphasis on planting and protecting vegetation corridors to enable wildlife to move from one area to another, and for seed dispersal. However, the word corridor implies a defined edge. A corridor can be wide but also functionally too narrow, such as a few rows of trees along a fence-line.
As a result of greater understanding of natural processes, the word connection is more meaningful and appropriate. Connections can vary through linked back yards where food and shelter trees are planted, to bush reserves adjoining a national park. So long as there is good continuity of the right type of vegetation, there is a connection. The Barung project Hinterland Bush Links is all about connections, and particularly about connecting the Conondale Range to the Blackall Range using the existing parks and reserves, and with the help of private landholders, filling in the gaps.
Birds move east and west as well as north and south depending on the season and the availability of food. They follow the flowering and fruiting of the many plant species whose timing varies with altitude as well as latitude. Along the way, flowers will be pollinated and seed dispersed, enhancing genetic diversity.
Grass is important vegetation too, especially when flowering and producing all that seed. Tall grass is habitat for small birds so avoid slashing, mowing, or grazing, where you can.
Landcare has also learned to Keep It Messy. The wildlife in the garden as well as in the revegetation or park will really appreciate a pile of branches or rocks, a good layer of litter or an old log. Lizards will shelter, insects will devour the fungi rotting the wood, birds will eat the insects and so on up the food chain.
Don’t burn those bits of timber or piles of leaves, find a corner for them and KIM instead. And, if you absolutely have to have a corridor, roughen the edges with grass and leave all the litter on the ground.
BARUNG NATIVE PLANT NURSERY Phone 5494 3151
Porters Lane Nursery opening times: Wednesday – Friday – 9am -3pm
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