Replanting the Creek

Area L (Meadowvale Drive) is getting prepared to plant on Friday June 6th from 10am. Walk through to the creek between houses no. 64 and 66 Meadowvale Drive (opposite Perennial Rise) to find the co-ordinator Silvanna whom you can also contact prior to the day on 5241 4042.(Geelong Info Pages map 17 D5).

Area M Planting day - Sunday June 15th, from 10am. Meet at end of Chenin Drive (Geelong Info Pages Map 17 C5).

The only things you need to take to planting days are appropriate clothing, gloves, drinks and snacks if you need them. Everything regarding the planting the trees and shrubs will be provided including a horticulturist supervisor.

In April there was a good turn out of members at the Barwon Water Community Nursery to transplant the seedlings that had been grown from seed collected beside the creek and propagated a few weeks before. If all goes well these may be ready for planting late this year.

Weed removal to make way for new plants

A plant recently found by Silvanna's daughter had small tomato-like fruit. It is a Kangaroo Apple, an indigenous plant, related to tomatoes. It has large dark green leaves that are often shaped like a kangaroo's footprint. It is growing among dead boxthorn and is positively hanging with bunches of bright yellow fruit. They are full of seeds, good for producing more plants. They were a koorie food plant, but often taste bitter.

Kangaroo Apple
Photo. Valda Dedman

The old bridge under the highway

Do you recognize this?
Photo. Valda Dedman

The old stone bridge over the creek at the junction of the Colac and Anglesea roads was built in 1868. The first bridge was a wooden structure which was so damaged by a flood that the Colac coach became 'wedged in loose timber and caused a traffic jam with no fewer than 20 vehicles of different types waiting to pass'[1].

The stone bridge was designed by Andrew McWilliams, who also designed the Portarlington Mill, and built by Clement Nash. A special grant of £500 was sought by Barrabool Council for its construction. A reminder of the former Shire remains in the bluestone keystone elaborately carved with the Shire's coat of arms. Such keystone ornamentation on a bridge is rare. The bridge is finely crafted and built of local Waurn Ponds limestone and bluestone. There are bluestone pavers on the bed of the creek. Do these mark a crossing place that predates the bridge?
1. Wynd, I. 1992. Barrabool land of the magpie.

Fairies in Mud Bottles,

The way under Hendy Main Road
Photo. Valda Dedman

Up in its headwaters, under the shadow of Mt Moriac, our little creek passes under Hendy Main Road. It has to flow through a bluestone doorway and along a corridor before it emerges into a tiny wetland with reeds. Where the roof of the corridor meets the wall there is a row of mud bottles with long necks. These are the nests of Fairy Martins, little swallow-like birds with ginger heads, satiny blue-black shoulders, white rumps and square (not forked) tails.

Fairy Martin nests under the bridge
Photo. Valda Dedman

Fairy Martins very sensibly move north for the winter, but come September they will return to the nest colony and mend any broken bottles before laying 4-5 speckled white eggs. The nest with its long-necked entry tunnel is built by both sexes. Each little mud pellet is a beakful gathered probably from the banks of Waurn Ponds Creek.

They are shy birds but if you keep very still and quiet you may see them hovering at the nest entrance and then darting in with food for the baby birds.

Mandama Primary School MAD Day