Introduction
The local community is working together with students and teachers on bushland adjoining Ferny Grove High School. We aim to restore riparian
vegetation to a section of parkland along the lower portion of Cedar
Creek, a tributary of Kedron Brook. The section lies just North and South of the road bridge in Tramway Street (UBD Ref.
Map 137 L3).
The area varies from dry sclerophyll forest
on top of higher ground through to small areas of remnant rainforest to
areas completely covered with exotic weeds such as Morning Glory,
Madeira Vine and Guinea grass.
This section was one of the first areas in the Brisbane City area for the weed Dyschoriste depressa to be found soon after 2000. This highly invasive weed was thought to have been spread through contaminated mowers and is a serious threat at a number of forest remnants such as Sparkes Hill Water Reserve along Kedron Brook.
Background
 The
park project was started in 1994 when a small group of students entered
a competition to establish a permaculture garden. They approached
Brisbane City Council for permission to use the park. This involved
removing an enormous amount of lantana.
A few years later, Brisbane City Council
approached the school with respect to maintaining the areas around the
garden. This encouraged the school to use the park for education of their
students and to set up community revegetation days for the local
community. They were helped in this by a grant from Pioneer Concrete that
allowed them to buy materials such as tube stock and stakes. The high school also has
a small school nursery on site that allows teachers and their students to propagate some of our
local species.
An offshoot of the project, was that two of
the school's students, Tristan and Andrew, expanded the area together as part of the Men Of The Trees organisation of volunteers with great enthusiasm! See Cedar Creek Bushcare Group that has made great progress in the adjoining parkland near the Police Station called Ferny Grove Parkland.
Frog Habitat
Development
The high
school students were very busy during the last term of 2003 with
their Frog Habitat. They were helped considerably by the fact that three
of their students, Bronwen Wynn-Hughes, Melissa Attwater and Sheree
Osbourne, won the high school section of the Waterwise garden
competition.
 Part of their prize was three days
on-ground support from Conservation Volunteers, with two of these days
spent working on the frog habitat beside the students. The project involved clearing the rubbish from
the site, laying down geofabric, placing 6 cubic metres of large rocks
on the fabric and then filling with small stones and concrete blend.
This sounds so easy! Finally, the
mix was watered in lightly. The students seemed to enjoy this bit the
most.
There is still
a continuous need for planting and mulching around the edges. In 2005, suitable signagewas placed up around the site with Janet White's
valuable creative assistance.
Recently, a large area of guinea grass was slashed and vines removed or poisoned . In June 2008, a thousand natives were planted by Men of the Trees, Rotary Club of Mitchelton, Ferny Grove State High School, local volunteers and staff and management of Brisbane City Council. It is hoped this successful project will allow a regenerated understory of natives to take over.
Group Contact
These activities are advertised on a notice
board shown in the parkland to the east of the Ferny Grove State High School. (UBD Ref.
Map 137 L3).
Contact details:
John Jordaan on phone (07) 3332 4513 or by E-mail: john.jordaan@bigpond.com |
