April Outing Report - 12 April 2026, Laidley

 Adapted from the TFNC newsletter report by B. Dyke.

Old Man's Beard
Photo: M. Simmons

The 13 members of the club who attended the outing to our hosts’ property in Laidley could only admire their achievement in terraforming their denuded steep urban block into a living, vibrant ecosystem. The property is a ‘Land for Wildlife’ refuge with predominately native species from the area. All plants on the property are encouraged to self-seed and consequently a rich understorey of vegetation covers the property beneath larger and taller trees. All these plants being able to thrive on poor, shallow, sodic soils is down to the natural vegetation and water management which allows maximum retention while channelling excess without erosion.

Bird life is plentiful and active and our host said she didn’t mind the Currawongs in the garden as they were good ‘seed spreaders’ and the garden is designed with many habitats for smaller birds to escape the currawongs and raptors. Brush turkeys are part of the landscape but are controlled and limited to a certain area of the property by controlling their access to nest-building mulch. Snakes are also very welcome (but not so much i

Stonework to manage the storm water
Photo: M. Simmons

n the house!).

Many different tree species were encountered including Eucalypts, Melaleuca, Brachychiton, Pittosporum, etc. A number of delightful native Bauhinia (with the much smaller leaf than the introduced common species) was appreciated by many of the group.

The group then retired to Cunningham Crest Lookout for lunch and to take in the relaxing panorama of Laidley and its valley.

MAY 2026 Activity Details - Friday meeting, and the Sunday outing to three vine scrub hilltops in the Gowrie-Kingsthorpe area

 CLUB MEETING: 

Painted honeyeater, 
Grantiella picta 
Photo: Roger Jaensch

Date & Time: 7 pm, Friday 01 May 2026

Speaker:  Roger Jaensch

Title: The Habitat Jondaryan Initiative. Biodiversity discoveries in the woodlands, grasslands and waterways of Jondaryan

Summary: Roger Jaensch has been interested in Australia’s bird life since school days, encouraged and enabled by parents and friends and by living in five states/territories as well as overseas. His working days involved nature conservation through coordinating bird surveys by volunteers, expeditions to remote regions, promoting management of wetlands, and project development and administration. Roger’s career was partly with non-government organisations, and he was self-employed before retirement. He especially enjoys the challenge of finding secretive waterbirds and breaking new ground in community projects. Over the past several years he has acted as voluntary facilitator for the Habitat Jondaryan Initiative.

Venue: St. Anthony’s Community Centre, Memory Street, Toowoomba. The speaker's presentation is followed by official business and supper. 

CLUB OUTING: 

Hilltop Drive, Rosalie Heights
Photo: Google Maps

Date: Sunday 03 May 2026  

Meeting Time:  8.30am

Where: Gowrie Junction on the Gowrie-Tilgonda Road opposite the Convenience Store. Or, from here continue west for 0.6 kilometres, turn RIGHT onto Gowrie Lilyvale Road for 1.1 kilometres, turn LEFT onto Gowrie-Glencoe Road for 0.8 kilometres, turn LEFT onto Baxters Road and continue to Hilltop Drive. 

Description: (This is the outing planned for March which was cancelled due to wet weather.)

Vine scrub hilltops. Rosalie Heights, Mt. Storey and Mt. Kingsthorpe offer easy access to small patches of remnant vine scrub with panoramic views across the Darling Downs.

Activities: 1. After a short walk along the edge of this patch of vine scrub, we will continue around Hilltop Drive to a private garden where a small patch of remnant vegetation was saved by the owners from clearing when the Rosalie Heights estate was built. Following this we will return down the hill stopping for morning tea. 

2. After morning tea we will continue to the Terry Egan Park, Mt Storey area just south of              Glencoe Mountain for a walk where there is a picnic table and views to the west.

3. Continuing on to Kingsthorpe to Settlers Park where there are two options. 

Mt Kingsthorpe Vine Scrub
Photo: M. Simmons

(i)  a short drive to the base of Mt. Kingsthorpe        and a 450-metre walk from there through           vine scrub along a well-formed path with             some steps to the top. (Difficulty level 3:               Suitable for most ages and fitness levels.               Some bushwalking experience preferable.             Tracks may have short steep hill sections a           rough surface and many steps. ).

   (ii)  700-metre ‘Rosalie Walk’ – part of the             Kingsthorpe Linear Corridor. (Difficulty -             level 1:  No bushwalking experience                       required. Flat even surface with no steps or         steep sections. Suitable for wheelchair users       who have someone to assist them.)

4. Return to Settlers Park for lunch.

Facilities: only at Settlers Park 

What to Bring: suitable clothing and closed footwear for walking in the bush, sunscreen, insect repellent, water, morning tea and lunch, chair, and the usual naturalist stuff of your choice; binoculars, camera, field guides, notebook, etc.

For further enquiries please contact toowoombafieldnaturalists@gmail.com

April Activities Details - (CHANGE OF DATE DUE TO EASTER)

Pepe Clarke

CLUB MEETING: 

Date & Time: 7 pm, Friday 10 April 2026

Speaker:  Pepe Clarke

Title: Nature Conservation in Outback Australia

Summary: Pepe Clarke is a conservation policy specialist based on the Sunshine Coast with 25 years’ experience working to protect nature in Australia and internationally. His work focuses on large-scale habitat protection and conservation policy. From 2017 to 2022 he worked with the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Outback to Oceans program, collaborating with governments, indigenous organisations and community partners to secure new protected areas and strengthen support for conservation across remote landscapes. This included major commitments to new national parks, Indigenous Protected Areas and Indigenous ranger programs. Pepe has also held senior roles with WWF International, BirdLife International and the Nature Conservation Council of NSW, contributing to conservation initiatives in Australia and around the world.

Venue: St. Anthony’s Community Centre, Memory Street, Toowoomba. The speaker's presentation is followed by official business and supper. 

CLUB OUTING: Rejuvenation of an Urban Laidley Block 

Stone channels created 
to manage water flow

Meeting Time: 9.00 am

Where: Lions Park, Vaux Street, Laidley

Description: Put a soil scientist and a stone wall specialist on a denuded steep urban block and marvel at their achievement over the last thirty years. The owners have managed their sodic soils around water management with deep channels, pools and drainage to a neighbour’s dam while regenerating with local plants (many obtained from the Tanglewood Nursery). Some of the species now present include Alphitonia, Brigalow, Silky Oak, Bloodwood, Moreton Bay fig, Cassia brewsteria, White cedar, Pittosporum, Syzygium, native Bauhinia, Brachychiton, Eucalypts and Melaleuca with attention given to butterfly host plants. Vines and grasses help replicate natural vine scrub. Many lichens grow on trees and rocks.

An area for ponded water
created to retain flood water 

Activities: Car pooling from Lions Park is suggested as parking at the property is limited. After an interesting morning with Pam and David we will return to the Lions Park before driving to the Cunningham Crest Lookout for lunch.

Facilities:  Toilets at Lions Park, Laidley. No facilities at Cunningham Crest Lookout.

What to Bring: Come with morning tea, lunch, chair, water, sun protection and an enquiring mind.

March Activity Details - Outing Cancelled

CLUB OUTING: CANCELLED, 8 Mar 2026

The possibility of significant rainfall is too high to ignore.

The outing will be rescheduled for later in the year.

Vine Scrub at Mount Kingsthorpe

CLUB MEETING: 7 pm, Friday 6 March 2026 

Mt Kingsthorpe hovea

Speaker: Dr Jen Silcock is a Research Fellow at the School of the Environment, University of Queensland. She spent her first 20 years on the Darling Downs before heading into the drier country further west in search of cryptic species, lost oases, ecological mysteries, obscure local history and the elusive perfect swimming spot. She has worked for various Government Departments and, for the past decade, at the University of Queensland, on projects relating to rangeland ecology, grazing land management, threatened species, wetland ecology and ethnobotany.

Title: Ecology and conservation of two cryptic and threatened outback mammals: the yellow-footed rock wallaby and greater bilby.

Venue: St. Anthony’s Community Centre, Memory Street, Toowoomba. The speaker's presentation is followed by official business and supper. 

February Outing Report - 08 February 2026 Franke Scrub and Rogers Reserve

 Outing Report: Sunday 08 February 2026 Franke Scrub and Rogers Reserve (Adapted from an article and photos D Johnston)

Franke Scrub
from Google Maps

Franke Scrub is a small patch of Semi-Evergreen Vine Thicket remaining in a gully along Franke Road.

Semi-Evergreen Vine Thicket is widely scattered along the northeast of Australia. With the arrival of European farmers much of the SEVT types have been extensively cleared so many SEVT ecosystems have only 5% or similar surviving. They contain a large variety of flora (and dependent fauna) but small patches can suffer considerably from isolation.

Weeds choking roadside

Locals formed a group to look after the patch in the days of Crows Nest Shire Council, and with the assistance of Steve Plant and some crew from CN council removed most of the invasive weeds. After the council amalgamation with Toowoomba Regional Council the local weeding volunteers have been managed by TRC and have managed to keep most of the weeds in the gully under control.

Discussing the sign

Much effort cataloguing the biodiversity has been done. Lists of birds, butterflies and regenerating flora are available for those interested with notes on species that would be expected to be seen as regenerating seedlings. Inside, the dense edge the SEVT has been coping well, showing old vines and new seedlings growing with the competition of choking invasive weeds.

Vines in Franke Scrub

After morning tea we moved to Charles and Motee Rogers Bushland Reserve which was donated to the Crows Nest Shire Council in the 1990s. It had been a grazing paddock with numerous tall remnant eucalypts and mostly a grass understory. In the early 2000s council and the local Landcare group had a controlled burn in the northern part and planted a lot of extra trees, mostly from stock in or near the park. Crows Nest Shire Council also had explanatory notes for sites along the walk for visitors.

Species List for Franke Scrub     

Birds: Spotted Dove, Crested Pigeon, White-faced Heron (flying overhead), Cattle Egret (flying overhead), Scaly-breasted Lorikeet, Pale-headed Rosella, Superb Fairy-wren, Brown Honeyeater, Noisy Miner, Eastern Whipbird, Torresian Crow, Silvereye, Mistletoebird, Double-barred Finch.

Mammals: Red-necked Wallaby

Insects: Orchard Swallowtail Butterfly, Graphic Flutterer Dragonfly, Black-faced Percher Dragonfly.

Entrance to Reserve

Aerial View of
Charles & Motee Reserve
from Google Maps

Species List for Charles and Motee Rogers Reserve      

Birds: Common Bronzewing, Rainbow Lorikeet, Laughing Kookaburra, Noisy Miner.                

Insects: Orchard Swallowtail Butterfly, Sand Wasp (Bembix sp.) Lots on the path into the reserve. Shooting dirt out of their burrows.

Sunday 8th February 2026 - Franke Scrub. and Charles and Motee Rogers Bushland Reserve, Highfields.

Meeting Time: 8.30 am.

Small-leaved Tylophora
Tylophora grandiflora
found at Franke Scrub
and should be flowering
in February
Photo: L Beaton

Where: Peacehaven Botanic Park at 56 Kuhls Road, Highfields to car pool as car parking is limited at Franke Scrub.

Description: Franke Scrub is a small but incredibly diverse rare dry rainforest remnant with 38 types of rainforest trees, 21 types of shrubs, 15 types of climbers and 40 other native plant species on the local volcanic red soil. Nearby the Charles and Motee Rogers Bushland Reserve consists of remnant dry rainforest and eucalypt woodland plants. Both areas are managed by volunteer workers who meet regularly to maintain and weed these endangered ecosystems.

Activities: The terrain down to the gully is quite steep while a gentle walk along the roadway has many informative signs identifying the easily seen nearby plants. More about Frank Scrub here.

After morning tea, return to Peacehaven Park (for use of toilet facilities) before continuing north-east on Kuhls Road. For those arriving independently – turn left onto Clarke Road, right onto O’Brien Road, next left onto Polzin Road and left onto Rogers Road. Off road parking is available on the left. The well-defined walking tracks through this Reserve allow for easy walking. More about the Rogers Reserve here.

Facilities: None. Toilets at Peacehaven Botanic Park.

What to Bring: chair, lunch and morning tea, water, hat and sun protection.

Our first function for 2026: Peacehaven Botanic Park, 56 Kuhls Rd, Highfields

Happy Naturalizing New Year 2026

Marvel at the changes since our first visit to the park in December 2009.

TFNC Members with Robert Campbell in 2009

By time-honoured custom we do not have an evening meeting or an outing in January. Instead we have a members' get-together.

Meeting Date & Time:  Saturday, 17th January, commencing at 4pm.

Where:  Peacehaven Botanic Park, 56 Kuhls Rd, Highfields.

Description: We will meet on the grassy area near the rotunda. There will be several tables provided for food items.

Activities: Those wishing to have a wander around the park are of course welcome to arrive earlier. 

Level of Fitness: Easy, graded and surfaced paths.

Facilities: Toilets.

What to Bring: please bring your own chairs, nibbles to share and drinks. Insect repellent might also be advisable.

This is always a good opportunity to catch up, and to welcome new members.