Weeds & Water

PHCC staff, Kristy and Victoria were joined by Newmont volunteers, Jordan and Paul at Williams River which is one of eight River Action Plan (RAP) sites in the Hotham-Williams sub catchment.

The day’s task was to locate and remove rye grass and other invasive species the manual way! This site has already undergone revegetation in addition to carefully targeted weed spraying throughout the year.  A select few areas of riparian vegetation had been left untouched from herbicide application to protect the native couch (Sporobolus virginicus) growing naturally, and the native seedlings planted in July. Capturing the precise moment before the rye grass had set seed, we manually removed it from these areas to minimise future spread. Sometimes a little extra effort (from the care taken by our weed control contractor and our weed-pulling volunteers) can go a long way in allowing native species to prosper and grow.

 

To water or not?

There are advocates of not watering at all when it comes to revegetation with native species. A proportion of seedlings will always be lost during the first summer (some sites more than others) and those can be replaced on an annual basis to gradually revegetate an area. Others might choose to water seedlings only a few times over the first summer when temperatures are forecast to push 40 degrees for several days. We chose to water some of the seedlings at the Williams RAP site during the weeding effort for a number of reasons including the current heat wave, highly compacted (and structure-less) saline soil conditions, easy access to the river water nearby, and people power to cart buckets!

This project is funded through partnerships with both South32 Worsley Alumina and Newmont Australia (Boddington).