For over 20 years Muckleford Catchment Landcare Group have been designing plantings with climate change patterns in mind, and encouraging local landowners to consider the advantages of planting a wide range of species and provenances from many bio regions of Eastern Australia.
Within the community there have been government-funded plantings, including riparian restoration and habitat corridors, as well as some tens of thousands of rehabilitation plantings by members of the Muckleford Landcare group.
Elli Wellings and David Mallard purchased their 100-acre property in Walmer a few years ago, which was once used to graze sheep. They immediately did two things – reached out to the local community, and joined their local Landcare group.
As a first step, Elli and Dave made an effort to seek out expert advice about landscape function and plant selection in order to better understand the land they had in front of them, and what they could do to improve it.
It was not viable to have stock, and the couple’s long term vision was for the land to be restored. “We could see how the stock has impacted on the existing vegetation” said David. Ellie’s father is a bush regenerator in NSW so she understands how worthwhile it is to bring back native animals to a degraded landscape.
Over the past 12 months Dave and Elli have transformed their property, with the help of landscape restoration practitioner and Muckleford Catchment Landcare Group Vice President, David Griffiths. Together, they put in 6,500 plants on 10 acres as part of a farm forestry enterprise. Then came revegetation of an old paddock with a further 2,500 native plants to create a wildlife corridor between two dams. This corridor contains 20 species from wide-spaced trees to middle/understory plants, with a dynamic species provenance selection.
David and Ellie have spent nearly $50,000 to restore their new property and plant their forest. They are a glowing example of the type of tree-changers that add value to our Landcare movement.
Muckleford Landcare 