The next working bee for the Armidale Urban Rivercare Group (AURG) will be held near SportUNE from 9:00am on Sunday February 11, 2012.
Over the next couple of months AURG will be combining with UNE Landcare to clean up sections of Dumaresq Creek between the colleges and the university, with support from UNE Facilities Management Services. We also plan to continue the native species planting that is looking so good east of the goat track bridge opposite the Sports Union.
The UNE campus has been the focus of Landcare groups for nearly two decades. In 1995, 8.5ha was converted from introduced pasture into native bushland to complement the existing Snow Gums woodland below Trevenna Rd. The planting is visible on your left, as you ride past Wright Village on the bike track towards the university.
Work on campus was started again in 2004 with plantings near Lake Zott, and near the goat track bridge extending to the west as far as the crossing below Robb College. Recent mulching has emphasised the health of many of the earlier plantings with some Eucalypts now reaching three to four metres high. UNE and TAS students, PLC students from Croydon and AURG volunteers have already contributed to working bees to regenerate the area over the last eight years.
UNE Landcare hopes to develop further momentum with the creek work and to begin cleaning up the areas further east of the goat track. Some of the old willows that have collapsed in the stream need to be removed to improve stream flow, and the banks need to have many weed species removed and be replanted with natives to stabilise them.
The work still to be done along Dumaresq Creek is always more than the current membership of AURG can deal with in a monthly working bee, so don’t hesitate to come along and get your hands dirty (better bring some gloves). And if we don’t do it, the willows, as lovely as they are, will choke the creek as they have in many places between the university and Cooks Road.
On Sunday, February 11, park at SportUNE and follow the path to the east of the playing fields down to the “Goat Track’ bridge crossing the creek at about 9am with your hat and gloves. Signs will be up, and we will look forward to a chat over morning tea and a barbie for lunch, for a gold coin donation, cooked by the redoubtable Armidale Lions.
Story: Armidale Urban Rivercare Group
