Pines Reserve

This is the sequel to our important, long-running article,"SEITA Bulldozers imminent on Westerfield Bushland Sth Frankston - Picket-line plans up to Victorian Elections" (was "SEITA Bulldozers threaten...". Update, Monday 27 September 2010: VCAT Appeal and Be ready on site for action Tuesday 28 Sep
On 21 September 2010, Gillian Collins, who has led the defense of the Pines Bushland and wildlife corridors, against the Frankston Freeway for years now, may have taken her final physical stand on this on the battlefield at Westerfield, where she has been manning a picket-line since Monday 5 July 2010. I doubt, however, that we have heard Gillian's last word on this matter, because as she went down, she was brandishing papers and talking barristers.


[Clarification: Linking Melbourne Authority is the new organisation or name which has replaced SEITA in this section of the Freeway. It's hard to keep up with these name changes.]

Update, Monday 27 September 2010: VCAT Appeal and Be ready on site for action Tuesday 28 Sep

Here is news from the front concerning the threatened destruction of historic Westerfield with construction of Peninsula Link (Frankston Bypass). As reported earlier. on Thursday 23 September 2010 Roads Minister Tim Pallas gave an undertaking that work would be suspended until after a VCAT appeal had been heard.

The AbiGroup and its sub-contractors are apparently not working on the property today, Monday, because they have an agreement with CFMEU to honor their "lock down" week-end.

Gillian Collins says that if the AbiGroup and Linking Melbourne authority do not comply with Minister Pallas' decision to suspend the work until the VCAT appeal has been heard, then we will need to show up in force at Westerfield on Tuesday - tomorrow - to continue to make our case.

So the message is - prepare to come to Westerfield tomorrow early if possible. Check later today on www.savethepines.net. This will have current information. Gillian suggests that if there is to be a picket tomorrow coming to the Westerfield house parking lot and then walking down to the picket line. Hundreds of people have visited the picket over the past months. The community support is very much appreciated.

Contact: Gillian Collins, Pines Protectors Phone: 03-9782-5116 Mobile: 0414 309 960
Source: Julianne Bell, Protectors of Public Land

From Gillian: Update#1, 0815hrs, 23-9-2010

Police informed Gillian and site manager confirmed that no trees will be cut down today. Site fences will be built.

From Gillian: Update #2, 22-9-2010

It was a long day today - but what a day! About 60 protestors came to our community picket today and stopped the bulldozers. We owe you such a great debt of gratitude. As Shakespeare's Richard V said in a very loose modern translation - you should have been there!

I am in awe of the courage shown by our faithful band, and by the exceptional work and support shown by the two CFMEU organisers who came to help. Thanks to them and some great mediation by the Frankston Police, we have a short reprieve until 7:00am Thursday morning. Between now and then the Pines Protectors under the auspices of the Frankston North Community Group, Inc. will be filing a case with VCAT to stop the contractor until offsets required by the Native Vegetation Framework are secured. We will also continue to work with the CFMEU and the contractor to get more time.

If we can't stop the contractor from continuing, the bush will be destroyed on Thursday. We saw enough raw power in their three PC300 excavators and a bulldozer today to destroy Westerfield's in a day - a terrifying thought. Some of us will still be there trying to stop them on Thursday. We would welcome your companionship and participation as we face this real life terror.

Gillian Collins
Pines Protectors
0414 309 960

Update 22-9-2010

"Protest co-ordinator Gillian Collins said the group would go to the planning tribunal today to see if there were legal avenues to stop demolition. If the group is successful, the case could become the first test of state legislation put in place last year to stop last-minute legal objections delaying big transport projects. Ms Collins said police had informed the protesters they would be arrested on Thursday morning if they remained. Abigroup spokeswoman Carol Bartley said yesterday work had been put on hold until Thursday morning."
Source: Clay Lucas, "Protesters fight to delay Frankston Bypass work," The Age, September 22, 2010.

The Front Line

Gillian Collins, who has led the defense of the Pines Bushland and wildlife corridors, against the Frankston Freeway for years now, may have taken her final physical stand on this today, September 21, 2010, at Westerfield, where she has been manning a picket-line since Monday 5 July 2010F. The freeway is the work of SEITA and the Victorian Government, and this encounter was with Abbey Road Construction. I doubt, however, that we have heard Gillian's last word on this matter, because as she went down, she was brandishing papers and talking barristers.

Negotiations

Good for her!

She continued to negotiate firmly right to the end with an Abbey Road Construction team, on behalf of the picketers, and all remained on site, to block the passage of the bulldozers in order to defend the wildlife and the trees.

As the picketers stood their ground against several bulldozers, whilst awaiting the arrival of the police, other construction workers began to chainsaw trees at the other end of the property, where the picket-line had its marquee.

Ceci Cairns painting one final beautiful record of tragically destroyed beauty

(My apologies at not getting a picture of the painting which could be reproduced on its own. It is a lovely painting and should become valuable as a unique aesthetic record as well.)

An artist working there, Ceci Cairnes, who had been painting the trees and the tent, was alarmed to see the chainsaws arrive. "No-one even spoke to me. Not even to tell me to be careful. They just began sawing down trees."

When I left only a few trees had been sawed down, here and there, as though the moonscapers didn't want their work to look too obvious right away. Perhaps they intended to finish it at night. A woman carrying one small animal cage - the kind you take a cat to the vet in, followed behind a small group of construction workers, which proceeded towards a large, beautiful dam, surrounded by luxuriant vegetation. As they disappeared among the foliage, I heard their chainsaws start up.

War-zone

My dog had been waiting for me in the car for a couple of hours, so I was anxious to take him walking. I consoled myself with the idea that there were still some areas between here and the Pines Reserve where we could walk off-leash for a kilometer or two without putting wildlife in danger. Heading for the area between Skye Road and the Pines, that runs parallel with McClelland Drive, I passed scenes of complete devastation. Next door to and opposite Peninsular Private Hospital, on the corner of McClelland and Cranbourne Road were moonscaped, with not a tree standing, but mounds of massacred vegetation with broken trunks and branches poking out, and hills of bare, drying earth. You could almost hear the silent screams - or perhaps they were my own - as the earth and the creatures in it died and released the carbon they had stored in their living bodies.

There was industrial mowing along McClelland Drive. Bulldozer-like machines with long metal arms with lawnmowers on the end mowed the roadside vegetation on the left as they drove down the road. This was the first time I had seen such machines. I marvelled at their number, at the embodied energy in these monsters, and at the trouble engineers take to remove every last scrap of life from their projects.

No-where to walk left

When I got to Skye Road, I reeled in horror, because the bushland on both sides was also now reduced to mute and damaged carcasses, bulldozed up to form a dark wall on the horizon. I saw that the actual tree-lined-track beside walled new suburbs that I usually took from Skye Road to the Pines had been spared, although everything between it and McClelland Drive had been blasted. Determined to console myself with this last remaining bit of green, I drove the car up to it and parked. My dog got out of the car eagerly, looking forward to running finally.

All part of "the plan"?

Alas, our way was barred. A grotesquely cheery blue sign announced on behalf of the Victorian Government that this was "all part of the plan!" Maybe body-snatchers have invaded our leaders in Victoria. That would explain their alien plans for the rest of us.

Infuriated, I drove on to a road that leads to the golf course on McClelland Drive. Word was that they had done a deal with SEITA to have their course saved when parts of the adjacent Pines Wildlife reserve had been sacrificed. I thought that I should be able to get into the reserve with my dog, via the golf-course. I realised I would have to keep my dog on a leash, but it would be better than nothing.

Locust-like swathe cuts Pines Reserve

The entrance gates to the Pines Reserve adjacent to the golf course were covered in signs telling the public to keep out, but the gates were wide open, and Nubi and I had had enough. We walked through the gates, heading for the sand-hills in the distance. Alas, to the left and to the right were more scenes of devastation. The bulldozers had already been through here too, leaving only a few self-important little men in florescent parkas walking about with mobile phones a few hundred meters away.

Log-truck load in Frankston Pines

My gaze was arrested by a truck bed stacked with enormous logs. I had not thought that there were such large trees left in this area. For a moment I thought this must be part of an exhibit I had seen in the outdoor exhibition at the McClelland Gallery, but these logs were much larger. I wondered what would happen to them.

At last I realised the extent of the Frankston Freeway: it was going to trash most of the bushland I had come to love in the 20 years since I moved into an old house here - no, not some new development. Below is my google-earth grab of what it looks like to me.

The Victorian Government is at War with Nature

The Victorian Government is at war with nature and the people who defend nature. It has been shown to flout its own laws on fauna protection. It presses the interest of property developers and passes laws to promote property development in the name of economic growth which it prioritises over all other things. It forces population growth on the people of Victoria and thus creates new pressures daily for our natural environment. We are not able to affect our government democratically on these issues because the opposition holds similar values to the government. The Victorian Greens won't criticise population growth or property development as priorities, only trying to minimise a harm which must eventually overwhelm all attempts to compensate for it or otherwise attenuate the damages it causes to our natural surroundings and the fauna which depend on them.

The Victorian government licenses agents, such as Abbey Road Constructions, to carry out its will and expects the police to back up such corporate activities in the field. It thereby forcibly exerts its will against democratic objection.

How should Citizens react to forcibly carried out undemocratic actions which they hate?

Most of us cannot afford to access the formal legal system and there are few laws to defend the environment and fauna and flora which the public can actually make a complaint under. Usually those laws require another party - often a State Government agent or an NGO in receipt of government funding - to act on behalf of the public and bring a complaint, and this so rarely happens.

In the absence of legal resources, for whatever reason - either by lack of money or lack of good laws, how should citizens react to force? They cannot afford to initiate force because the state holds the power and the means of savage repression. Citizens do, however, have the moral right to resist the state or its agents and contractors where they forcibly act against democratic objection and the spirit of laws to defend environmental and ecological values, for all kinds of reasons.

The importance of picket lines

The use of picket-lines represents a reasonable and defensible response where citizens use their bodies to resist the impacts of unreasonable government policies, whether carried out by a contractor or directly by government employees, in the opinion of this author.

Gillian Collins and others on the Westerfield Picket line took a courageous and necessary step in the battle of Victorians to defend their right to protect and conserve their natural surroundings and the right of indigenous fauna to live in peace. They have not won this battle, but the war is still on and there must be more battles.

Through incompetence and neglect 110 ha which was recently added to the Pines Flora and Fauna reserve was mismanaged by Parks Victoria and Department of Sustainability Victoria to the point where nearly all the species it contained have become extinct. Now this land is due to be separated by a huge tollway from the rest of the reserve, despite many bitter protests and submissions from residents and other concerned people, whose hearts are nearly broken. See also related articles

The death of the DARA land.

110 ha of land once belonging to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, known now as 'the DARA land" was recently added to the Pines Flora and Fauna reserve. Through incompetence and neglect it has been mismanaged by Parks Victoria and Department of Sustainability Victoria to the point where nearly all the species it contained have become extinct. Now, in a crowning act of environmental vandalism,[1] this land is due to be separated by a huge tollway from the rest of the reserve. This is to go ahead, despite many bitter protests and submissions from residents and other concerned people who do not want it.

Here Hans Brunner describes the process by which the species became extinct and pleads for the area to be rehabilitated. It is the least that the State government and SEITA (now renamed the Linking Melbourne Authority) can do. This time there should be transparent aims to increase the fauna species representation to its optimum and reproducible methods to test the success of the operation, so that the public may monitor the effectiveness of it.

Hans Brunner sends a plea to Department of Sustainability and Environment and to Parks Victoria to bring the Dara land back to life again. It can and must be done.

The future of the DARA land can be so much brighter than its past

The Dara land is the 110 ha that has been added to the Pines Flora and Fauna Reserve. It borders on Ballarto Rd and McClelland Drive and joins on to the golf course, North-East of the original Pines. The proposed Bypass will separate the two parcels of land.

Some twenty years ago the Dara land, then occupied by the Dept. of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, was teaming with wildlife. There were large colonies of Swamp Rats, lots of Bandicoot diggings everywhere, there were Wallabies, Ringtail- and Brush-tail Possums, Echidnas, an occasional Koala and Sugar Glider and only a very small number of Rabbits. This was the result of regular poisoning of foxes and rabbits and the total absence of dogs. Boundary fences were inspected weekly and repaired immediately.

After a large wildfire, it took about two to three years for these animals to recover to their original numbers, but they did so with the help of ongoing fox and rabbit control and the absence of dogs.

After Dept of Agriculture left, Parks Vic and DSE allowed ferals to run amuck

After the Dept, of Agriculture vacated the Dara land Parks Victoria was appointed to manage this land. Immediately fox and rabbit poisoning stopped, a number of gates were erected to allow people with their dogs to enter as well as foxes and cats. The bandicoots were the first to suffer. It took only about twelve months for them to totally disappear from the whole of the Dara land. Where there were once large colonies of Swamp Rats one could find only the mounds of soil where they used to be. Rabbit numbers increased and fox and dog foot prints became prevalent not only along the walking tracks but also throughout the bush land off the tracks.

20 yrs ago foxes' and domestic dogs' scats revealed diet of endangered fauna

During my many visits, I collected scats of foxes, cats and dogs containing hairs and identified them in order to determine the prey species.

Since we know already too well what foxes prey on I concentrated on dog scats with hairs of prey species. It is well known that some people encourage their dogs to hunt for rabbits in the Reserve and the dogs will than go for anything that moves including native animals. Bandicoots are especially vulnerable to predation as they have to dig deep holes to get to their food and then can easy be ambushed while doing so. They also have not got large ears like the rabbits have to hear predators approaching. Subsequently I established what the contents were of twenty four dog scats. Of these, 8 had Rabbit, 4 had Wallaby, 4 had Bandicoot, 3 had Brush-tail Possum, 3 had Ring-tail Possum and 2 had Swamp Rat. Fox scats had a higher proportion of Rabbits but preyed on all the other animals as well and included some Sugar Gliders and lots of lizards.

Now the same scats show diet of mostly rabbits

Fox and dog scats now contain manly rabbit and a few ring-tail possums as all the other small native animals have almost totally disappeared.

This was not helped when Parks Victoria control burnt a large area of prime bandicoot habitat and before this area could recover an adjacent area was also burnt. This resulted in the absence of all the animals that used to live there and consisted of about fifty percent of the whole Dara bush land.

Active fox dens are now distributed throughout the whole area and there is no hope for the native animals to become re-established again.

The ultimate blame lies with DSE and PV

The ultimate blame lies with DSE (Department of Sustainability and Environment)[2] and PV (Parks Victoria)[3]. They both were unwilling to protect the nationally endangered bandicoots and with it all the other native mammals, birds, lizards and frogs. How can they completely neglect and mismanage this prime habitat for not only this rare bandicoot but also for Koalas, Sugar Gliders, Swamp Rats, Echidnas, Brush- and Ring-tail Possums and all the other native wildlife! We have to urgently go back to the way the Dara land was managed by the Agriculture Dept.

In the absence of dogs, the control of foxes, cats and rabbits could than be carried out completely un-restricted and efficiently.

I plead with the DSE and PV to bring the Dara land back to life again. It can and must be done. If I had time, exactly the same story could be told about the Western half of the Pines where beside the predators and rabbits motorbike riders cause havoc to Wallabies, birds and other wildlife.

Hans Brunner

[1] Works undertaken by the Linking Melbourne Authority (once called SEITA) with the support of the Brumby government and your taxes.

[2] The Department of Sustainability and Environment has almost no staff devoted to actively protecting and sustaining healthy biodiverse fauna populations. DSE seems to be far more interested in pushing human population growth by stimulating high immigration, providing land to developers and pushing through infrastructure programs to the detriment of our indigenous fauna and the loss of green spaces. DSE is dominated by agriculturalists and property development oriented planners and technicians.

[3] Parks Victoria is a public authority (akin to a government department), funded from three major sources; payments from the State Government Budget (your taxes), an annual charge based on a property rate levied on all metropolitan properties, and user fees.
It is managed by a board with the following members:
Rob Gerrand, BA, FAMI, FAICD
Lois Appleby
Clarice Ballenden, BA (Hons) M.Ed.
Damien Bell
Rod Gowans, PSM.
Ken King, Dip. For., B.Sc (Hons)
Noel Harvey, OAM, MAICD
Jennifer Labourne, B.Bus, FCPA
Jan Mahoney BA, PhD, FAICD

What are these people doing with our money?

Population growth, climate change and industrial push threaten Westernport ecology

There seems to be a big focus on Westernport at the moment, as population growth, climate change and further industrialisation threatens to further harm its fragile ecology.

Ordinary people are worried about social and environmental impact

There has been a shift in attitude amongst ordinary people who are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of protecting our environment. The Global Financial Crisis, water shortage crisis, climate change and predicted population expansion have incited an awakening about how fragile our society is, and how dependent we are on the health of our environment and the role we all play in it.

Spread the word about Western Port Seagrass Partnership's DVD launch & website

Last week, SVCAG Vice President Gillian Collins and I attended the launch of The Western Port Seagrass Partnership's DVD about the loss of seagrass in Westernport and the efforts of WPSP and others to address this problem. We urge you to visit their website www.seagrass.com.au and click on the link to receive a free DVD, then spread the word to others. Raising awareness about the importance of a healthy Westernport is crucial to addressing the problems facing it.

Report on Victorian Transport Infrastructure Conference

On the 11-12th May, I attended the Victorian Transport Infrastructure Conference, representing various groups and individuals across Victoria. What amazed me was that although all roads lead to Hastings, as you can see from the q & a's asked at the conference, there are many questions still left unanswered. Interestingly, the speaker from Asciano (who own the interstate rail and the Port of Geelong) completely got it when I spoke with her about a National Transport Strategy which would allow for the utilisation of other existing container ports. We will follow up on that conversation shortly.

PoHLUTS Pollutes becomes PLUTS

Recently, we had Ralph Kenyon CEO of the Port of Hastings Corporation attend our committee meeting to discuss where the PoHLUTS [Port of Hastings Land Use and Transport Strategy (Consultation Draft)] stands now. (To our disappointment, they've taken the 'oH' out of it so now it's just 'PLUTS' - maybe they didn't think it was quite as funny as we did, that spell-check wanted to make it 'Pollutes'.)

Anyway, Mr. Kenyon informed us that the Port Futures document would be out in a few months which would outline the grand plan for Victoria's ports, and contain details in response to the original PoHLUTS. Keep an eye on www.portofhastings.vic.gov.au .

Why the Refusal to include SVCAG in PoHC "Community Reference Group"?

Ralph Kenyon

We have also requested several times that SVCAG be included on the Port of Hastings Corp Community Reference Group so that we may better inform you, our supporters, but Mr Kenyon refuses our request on the basis that 'this is the group we began with, so we'll keep it that way until we review it later when the next stage of the port strategy document is released.'

I'm sure if Mr Kenyon or the Chairperson of the CRG said to the other members of the group 'considering SVCAG have been heavily involved within the community helping us to raise awareness regarding the PoHLUTS, would it be OK that they join the group, particularly considering the professional manner they have maintained, and valid points they have raised?' I couldn't imagine anyone would refuse - would you?

PoHC funding not evident

In the meantime, the PoHC have been unsuccessful in their attempts to acquire funds from both state and federal governments to begin Stage 1 of their EES. After attending the Vic Transport Plan Conference, I'm not convinced that anyone has any money to do anything, let alone develop yet another port for container imports, especially when they haven't even finished dredging Port Phillip!

Frankston Bypass lacks financial, political and democratic support

Frankston bypass cuts and damages wildife corridor via The Pines

The Frankston Bypass, a key transport route for the Port of Hastings development as outlined in the PohLUTS, did not get complete funding in this year's State budget either, and got nothing from Infrastructure Australia. Mr Brumby is still talking as though it will go ahead, and there are surveys being conducted along the route. Gillian Collins, who has been working tirelessly to protect the Pines Flora and Fauna Reserve, along with local activists, has been visiting Federal and State politicians, Environment Victoria and Green Wedges Coalition representatives, and urges all of you to contact Federal Environment Minister, Peter Garrett and raise your concerns about the unnecessary construction when traffic congestion alternatives exist. There will be destruction of endangered habitat, and endangered species will be threatened if this freeway proceeds.

Again, the lack of funding gives us a bit of a reprieve and allows more time for people to connect the dots, and raise further awareness of the importance of protecting Westernport.

Catherine Manning
President
Southern Victoria Community Action Group Inc.
www.svcag.org
Contact her via contact at candobettter.org or via info[AT]Svcag.org

What kind of incompetent government cannot even keep small creatures like bandicoots from extinction? Wildlife ecologist and forensic animal hair identification expert, Hans Brunner, says politicians and greedy planners have seriously watered down and misinterpreted the meaning of the word 'reserve'. Parks Victoria complain about the lack of money, but spend money on infrastructure for people leaving no money for the protection of plants and animals, or for weeding, predator control and fencing, which should be their first and only priority.

by Hans Brunner

Obvious role of Nature Conservation Reserves

Nature Conservation Reserves are meant to be primarily secured for the protection and enhancement of indigenous plant and animals. These reserves must be strictly only used as a refuge for the plants and animals that have been destroyed everywhere else. Outside these reserves people have taken up over 95% of space available. This includes the many sports grounds, schoolyards, golf courses, botanical gardens, beaches and similar open spaces where people can enjoy open air activities.

Obvious role of Nature Conservation Reserves ignored and exploited for other reasons
Unfortunately, insensitive politicians, greedy planners and most of the selfish public have seriously watered down and misinterpreted the meaning of the word reserve. Why then call them 'reserves'?

It is obvious, when people already occupy 95 % of all the other space that the reserves are there to keep people out from what is clearly reserved for our unique plants and animals.

Offsets do not replace habitat
Whenever Nature Reserves are compromised and mutilated with infra structure, we are even hoodwinked to believe that offsets will replace lost habitat. But offsets are really only as good as criminal money laundering is. They are fake!

Humans do far more damage than the foxes, cats and dogs that get the blame
There is also no argument that in environmental terms, it is not foxes, cats and dogs, but us humans, who are the most serious pest species on earth. So, why are humans always given preference?

Yet humans are always given priority in 'Nature Reserves'
Whenever a master management plan is created for a Nature Reserve, it is always people that get the first consideration. The animals and plants have to suffer the consequences of these unbalanced decisions, which result in ongoing local extinctions, and in serious loss of biodiversity.

Parks Victoria cries poor but spends up big on humans

Parks Victoria is always complaining about the lack of money and we know why. They spend all the money on infra structure to accommodate people and then have no money left for the protection of plants and animals and for weeding, predator control and for fencing, which should be their first and only priority. A Nature Conservation Reserve is very much cheaper and easier to manage when people are mainly kept out of it. It becomes affordable.

...and fails to adequately monitor, mitigate and repair indigenous fauna and flora decline
Why doesn't Parks Victoria make plans to regularly monitor the presence of native plants and animals and to act when there is a decline or possible loss of a species? Have they ever made plans to re-introduce previously lost species?

Incompetent treatment and skewed priorities damage Pines Flora & Fauna Reserve

An area of prime habitat for the Southern Banded Bandicoot

A typical example is the near demolition of the Pines Flora and Fauna Reserve. Only a very short time ago this reserve has been doubled in size to 220 ha in order to protect and enhance the nationally endangered Southern Brown Bandicoot. Now it is going to be bisected by a four line freeway taking away a large area of prime habitat for bandicoots. As if this is not damaging enough, further plans are for a cycling and walking track, as well as lots of other walking tracks and a primary visitor node, involving lots of infra structure and parking space, all for the people at the expense of the plants and animals that are supposed to be protected. In the ex-Dara land, where bandicoots were most prevalent, a large area has also been taken over by a school, surrounded by several ha of open space. And this was not the end. To cap it all, a large housing estate has been placed exactly where bandicoots used to roam. DSE admits that because of all this habitat loss and disturbance caused, the Southern Brown Bandicoot may become lost in the Pines, but nothing is done to stop it.

And now the miserable history of the bandicoots.

When the Dara land was occupied by the Dept. of Agriculture and Vegetable Research, hundreds of bandicoots lived in the unused heath land. They were incidentally protected by regular poisoning programs of foxes and rabbits which did damage to the vegetables. In 1970’s, I (Hans Brunner) carried out a bait acceptance trial on bandicoots in the Dara land where I trapped twelve bandicoots. In the 1980’s I collected 18 bandicoots for the La Trobe University within two trap nights. They were still plentiful then.

Brunner indicating bandicoot diggings

Again in the Dara land, in 1997 Sally Kimber studied the bandicoots near whereI had earlier carried out the bait acceptance trial. Sally's supervisor was Peter Brown from Deakin University. I was also involved and inspected the trap lanes with Sally and Peter to examine the trapped bandicoots. In 1999, the Pines population of bandicoots were described again to be the largest on the Peninsula, ( Taylor ).

In 2005, about two years after the Dept. of Agriculture left the Dara land, a number of people including Dr.Terry Coats and I inspected the whole of the Dara land for the presence of bandicoots. No signs of bandicoots were found. The land has been opened to the public by installing gates to allow people with their dogs to roam freely throughout, what should have been a reserve for bandicoots.

Parks Victoria was now in charge and I blame them totally for the loss of these bandicoots. Fox control has stopped and rabbits have increased in numbers, all to the detriment of the bandicoots.

Shortly after Sally's study, her study area was burned for fire reduction without consulting ecologists to assess the possible danger to bandicoots. To rub salt into the wound, another, huge area of bandicoot habitat was also burned just next to it, long before any remaining bandicoots would have been able to have recolonise the previously burned area.

What else could be expected from Parks Victoria?

Really silly plans for a Primary Visitor Node must be stopped to save what is left

And now, the plans are to construct a “ Primary Visitor Node”, again just for the people, in the same Dara land with more visitor tracks that will meander throughout prime bandicoot habitat. Another part will be occupied by a cycle trail. Who knows what else will be added for human use at the expense of natural habitat?

This 'primary visitor node' must never be built anywhere within a reserve. Instead, this money should be spent on fox and rabbit control and on fencing.

Coming back to my opening remarks about the purpose of Nature Conservation Reserves, it is imperative that the whole of the Dara land (half of the total the Pines Flora and Fauna Reserve), be locked up and used for the urgent recovery of the nationally endangered bandicoots and all the other iconic native plant and animals that will benefit.

In the absence of people and dogs it will then allow for the unhindered control of foxes and rabbits. The area is already fenced with a type of fence that allowed bandicoots to flourish as they did when this area was managed by the Dept. of Agriculture.

There can be no more excuses! The other half of the Pines should also be used only for very passive recreation such as walking but without dogs!!

The four lane bypass and the cycle trail will always remain a shameful monstrosity which causes enormous damage, not only to the Pines, but the whole region.

Hans Brunner

J Bell to me
show details 3:22 PM (3 hours ago) Reply

Dear Protectors of Public Lands Victoria Inc. - Sheila and Jill You know people in Frankston. Can you circulate?

Rally to oppose Peninsula link Frankston Bypass Sunday 24 may , 2009, Noon at Trig Point.

Why Rally?: The proposed freeway the Peninsula Link will bypass Frankston and cut straight through the guts of the Pines Flora & Fauna Reserve.

When: Join Rod Quantock (Deputy President of Protectors of Public Lands Victoria Inc. PPL VIC) ) on Sunday 24 May at 12 noon
Where: The Excelsior Drive entrance to the Pines, Frankston North. Mel. 100 C9 to reclaim the Pines for the people of Frankston at Trig Point.

Website: The website Save the Pines will be launched at the same time. This website not only deals with the Pines, but also highlights other areas and flora/fauna that will be affected by the proposed Freeway. www.savethepines.net
Organisers: The Connies See www.connies.com.au

Why Save The Pines?

It was once described by the Victorian Government as the most botanically significant land in Melbourne's south and south east. It's the closest place this side of Melbourne where the swamp wallaby, echidna, koala, ringtail and bushy tailed possums, sugar glider and swamp rat roam freely. The Reserve has also supported the Swamp Skink, Dwarf Galaxias, Hooded Robin, the Powerful Owl and Swift's Parrot.

If not stopped, the SEITA by-pass and toll way will also cut a 4 lane 26 kilometre swathe through the landscape from Carrum Downs to Mount Martha. It will destroy an extraordinarily rare patch of Herb Rich Grassy Wetland at Carrum Downs, which Minister Jennings' experts say can't be offset or replaced. It will plough through 60% of the Belvedere Reserve in Seaford, the Pobblebonk/Willow Road Reserve and the Wittenberg Reserves in Langwarrin and destroy a pristine remnant at the heritage Westerfield property, whilst bisecting precious farmland on the Moorooduc Plain.

See also www.savethepines.net.

There are alternatives.

The Eureka Flag was flown at Trig Point in the 1970's by a group of residents to recalim the Reserve for the people of Frankston from development. The Pines bneed our help again. See you Sunday 24 May at the Excelsior Drive entrance to the Pines.

Contact: Julianne Bell Secretary PPL VIC 98184114 or 0408022408