STORY OF A CORAL LICHEN - Cladia retipora

In 1791 Bruni d'Entrecasteaux's ships La Recherche and L'Esperance set sail from France for Van Diemen's Land in the hope of locating the lost expedition of La Perouse. Jacques-Julien de Labillardiere was one of the three naturalists included in the complement of 400 men (and one woman in disguise) aboard the two ships.  Sailing via Tenerife and the Cape of Good Hope they arrived in van Diemen's Land in 1792 and de Labillar-diere, then aged 37, set about collecting specimens which included a coral lichen. He was the first European to explore inland Tasmania.

Both d'Entrecasteaux and his succeeding expedition commander Huon de Kermadec died at sea. In 1794, when the ships reached Java, it was to discover that Louis XVI had been executed and the French were at war with the Dutch. The ships, crews and goods were seized be the Dutch and Labillardiere taken prisoner. Although able to retain his journal the collection of specimens was sent to Europe on the Dutch ship Hooghly. The following year this ship was captured by the British in the Atlantic, the English and Dutch also being at war, and the collection was taken to London as a Royal Navy Prize.

De Labillardiere was able to return to France in 1796 and set about trying to recover his collection. One of the letters was sent to his friend Sir Joseph Banks who returned the specimens to him unexamined because Banks believed "science should rise above political differences".

It was not until 1806 that a description of coral lichen was, for the first time, described in a scientific journal. In the second volume of Novae Hollandiae Plantarum it was classified as an alga Baeomyces retepous.

* When de Labillardiere died in 1834 his collection was acquired by Philip Barker Webb, an amateur botanist, and is still housed in a museum bearing Webb's name in Florence.

* Lichens are composite organisms of fungi and algae or cyanobacteria and by convention now bear the binomial name of the fungus.  

(By Diana Ball)

                                                                                                               

WHO’S A PRETTY BOY, THEN?

Hybrid animals occurring in natural populations are rare and always arouse quite a bit of interest within the natural history fellowship whenever they’re encountered. Birds are the most often reported from the vertebrate classes probably because of the high visibility of these animals and the increasing popularity of birdwatching within the general community. And within the Aves, parrots and cockatoos feature highly as either captive bred mutations or naturally occurring hybrids. Over the years I’ve encountered Australian King Parrot and Red-winged Parrot hybrids a couple of times in the wild but recently got a “first” at Lake Galletly on the University of Queensland’s Gatton campus.

Earlier this year I was at this very popular birdwatching venue with good friend and fellow birder Terry Reis. At one stage our attention was drawn to an odd-looking cockatoo in company of about six Little Corellas. The bird looked like a very pale, “washed-out” Galah and Terry and I had decided that it was indeed one of this species with some sort of pigment aberration. At least this is what we thought until the cocky flew off with the corellas and starting calling to them in “Corella”. It was then that we realised that the bird was actually a hybrid of this species and the very common Galah; an interesting observation duly noted in our field books – then promptly forgotten. Forgotten at least until Sunday 23^rd August when I was again birding in the Lockyer with another birdwatching friend Russell Jenkins over from his home in Japan for a couple of weeks.

On this morning we were at Pechey Swamp on Old Ropeley Road, Lower Tent Hill near Gatton. This is another very popular birdwatching venue but on this morning there was little to see. As we were preparing to leave a small flock of Little Corellas arrived at the water body with a pair immediately inspecting potential nesting hollows in the bankside eucalypts. In their midst was a bird very similar to, if not actually the same as the hybrid that Terry and I had seen at Lake Galletly a few weeks ago. Again it was obviously in company with the corellas and calling in the same vein. It was also apparent that it was an established member of this flock despite its odd plumage. A picture is worth a thousand words as the old saying goes and, as Russell is an excellent bird photographer, I have the luxury of two excellent images of this bird to illustrate this small offering. I firmly believe that the Lake Galletly and Pechey Swamp bird is one and the same animal; these waterbodies are not that far apart as the cocky flies.

In Australian Parrots Vol. 1 Loriinae and Cacatuinae Forshaw J.M. & Cooper W.T. (1980), Lansdowne Editions, Melbourne on p.119 under the account for the Galah it states that this species has been hybridised by aviculturists with Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Slender (Long)-billed Corella, Major Mitchell Cockatoo, Gang-gang Cockatoo and Little Corella. In the wild hybrids between Major Mitchell and Little Corella have been reported. Under the entry for Little Corella on p. 140 the species is stated to have hybridised in captivity with the Galah and Sulphur-crested Cockatoo and in the wild with the Galah only.

It is curious how one subject leads to another when you start dragging books from your library shelf. My initial inquires in hybridisation of Australian parrots and cockatoos got me on to some other interesting titbits regarding these ubiquitous birds. In Ian Fraser’s and Jeannie Gray’s Australian Bird Names – a complete guide (2013), CSIRO Publishing, Collingwood, we’re informed that the word ‘Cockatoo’ first appears in English in the early 1600’s in the form ‘Cock-a-two’ and its origin is the Malay word kakatua (probably onomatopoetic in origin), which was incorporated into Dutch as kakatoe. Vieillot (1817) is believed to have used ‘cockatoo’ based on the call of ‘white cockatoos’.

Corella is derived from an Australian indigenous language although which one is unclear. The Australian National Dictionary has suggested it to be derived from the Wiradjuri garala whereas the Australian Oxford agrees but suggests the root word is garila. Galah is believed to have come from gilaa from the Yuwaalaraay language group on north-western New South Wales. The Galah has a host of other old monikers mostly derived from the indigenous peoples’ names for this lovely animal including Goolie, Goulie, and Willock. I particularly like Willie-willock thought to be a corruption of wilek-wilek from the Wembawemba of the Riverina and Wim-mera of southern Australia. The Galah’s scientific name Eolophus roseicapillus literally translates as ‘rosy-haired dawn-crest’; brings to mind Homer’s “rosy-fingered dawn”; Eos being the Greek goddess of Dawn and part of the Galahs’ generic epithet.

And so it goes … words – how lovely they are and what a fine tracery they weave through our language; end-lessly if you’ve a mind for it but I’d better stop now. Our Goolie is hanging by his feet from the roof of his cage clamouring for attention; a rose-mantled Narcissus with the screech of a Harpy.   

Article by Rod Hobson, photos by Russell Jenkins

OUTING REPORT - Geham area, Sunday 04 October 2015

This outing followed on from Dougal Johnston’s informative talk the previous Friday, when he introduced members to local endangered Regional Ecosystem RE 12.5.6.  This cryptic code is easily cracked: 12 refers to the Bioregion (Southeast Queensland); 5 refers to the Land Zone (old loamy and sandy plains and plateaus); and 6 to the Vegetation (too much to include, but concentrates mainly on type of tree cover). For those who would like to read and understand more on Regional Ecosystems, the Queensland Government website:  www.environment.ehp.qld.gov.au/regional-ecosystems/ provides a basic description of these ecosystems across Queensland.

A lengthy introduction, but the writer needed a little background knowledge.  The outing commenced at 8.30 am when twenty-two Nats assembled close to the old Mt Luke Siding on Aberdein Road, Geham. This area and Dougal’s property, were selected to show examples of some of the vegetation typical of R.E. 12.5.6: Eucalyptus propinqua (Grey Gum), E. Microcorys (Tallowwood), E. Acmenoides (Yellow stringybark), E. Siderophloia (Northern Grey Ironbark), E. Pilulris (Blackbutt). 

Close--up of Black Bootlace Orchid (Photo: Mike Ford)

Black Bootlace Orchid (Photo: M Ford)

A short walk along Aberdein Road, guided by Dougal, was followed by a scramble through the Geham National Park. Formerly the Geham Forest Reserve Scientific Area, the Park was declared in 2006, and would appear to have received little or no attention as it is infested with Lantana (Lantana camara). A few vines were struggling through the dense growth:  Billardiera scandens (Apple Berry), Cissus hypoglauca (Five-leaved Water Vine), Geitonoplesium cymosum (Scrambling Lily), Hardenbergia violacea (Native sarsaparilla), Pandorea pandorana (Wonga Vine), Stephania japonica var. discolor (Tape Vine). Parsonsia straminea (Monkey Rope Vine), a very vigorous climber, was well established on large trees at the edge of an adjoining private property.  Most trees in the Park were of intermediate size, in contrast to the large, old-growth trees at the edge of private property adjacent to the Park.  These old trees have been seeding the Park and a few small Allocasuarina torolosa  (Forest Oak), Grevillea robusta (Silky Oak), Maytenus bilocularis (Orange Bark), and a Tuckeroo (Cupaniopsis sp.) were identified.  An ‘unusual landform’ in the forest (a lure to pique curiosity) turned out to be a Scrub Turkey mound.  Various grasses, sedges, Lomandra and Dianella grew sparsely on the forest floor. Geham National Park is a sad example of a lost opportunity to support an endangered ecosystem.

The visit to the Geham National Park was followed by morning tea at Hampton, in the rest area of the grounds of the Information Centre. Refreshed and restored the group then made its way to the start of Merritts Creek Road where it inspected a revegetation site established by Main Roads.  It was disappointing to see that several of the saplings had been vandalised.  

Copper beard orchid (Photo: Mike Ford)

Moving on to Dougal’s well-maintained partially re-vegetated paddock, the contrast between his property and the Geham National Park was stark. A small herd of cattle grazes the paddock occasionally to keep grass in check, but don’t appear to have done any damage to emerging trees.  Dougal is planting local native trees to increase and improve an existing corridor, and encourages natural regeneration.  Areas with Lantana (Lantana camara) were cleared about 10 years ago and a variety of indigenous plants have re-established themselves, including Santalum obtusifolium (Sandalwood) a hemi-parasitic tree that obtains some of its water and mineral nutrient requirements from the roots of other plants. Eucalypts as described above (paragraph 2) were present but vines were less evident in the more more open situation, although two species of Clematis were noted. Rainforest species such as Eleodendrum australe var. Australe (Red Olive Plum), Matyenus biloculars (Orange Bark) and Psydrax odorata var. Buxifolia (Stiff Canthium) are becoming established. However, the plants that excited the most interest were the Copper Beard Orchid (Calochilus campestris) and the saprophytic Black Bootlace Orchid (Erythrorchis cassythoides).

Dougal’s property is a fine example of how, with care and dedication, an endangered ecosystem can be supported and encouraged to regenerate. Sadly, such pockets are now small and fragmented. 

The outing ended with lunch at Hampton. Our thanks to Dougal for a meticulously planned and interesting day.

(Report by Deb Ford)

Bird list from the Geham outing

Pheasant Coucal, Laughing Kookaburra, Forest Kingfisher, Galah, Sulphur-crested Cockatoo, Rainbow Lorikeet, White-throated Treecreeper, Variegated Fairy-wren, Superb Fairy-wren, Lewin's Honeyeater, Yellow-faced Honeyeater, Noisy Miner, Noisy Friarbird,  Scarlet Honeyeater, Spotted Pardalote, Striated Pardalote, White-browed Scrubwren, Grey Shrike-thrush, White-throated Gerygone, Eastern Whipbird, Grey Butcherbird, Pied Butcherbird, Australian Magpie, Pied Currawong, Black-faced Cuckoo-shrike, Rufous Whistler, Australasian Figbird, Willie Wagtail, Grey Fantail, Magpie-lark, Torresian Crow, Eastern Yellow Robin

(Compiled by Donalda Rogers)

 

Brown ringlet - Hypocysta metirius (Photo:Diana Ball)