Our morning at Wyreema was an excellent follow-up to Mick Atzeni’s talk
of Friday night. The whole project was much easier to conceptualise when we
could see the true scale of it, and get a feel for the lie of the land.
John Mills from Toowoomba Regional Council was kind enough to come and
explain to us the ins and outs of sewage treatment generally, and what the
changes in Toowoomba’s sewage management mean for the Wyree-ma wetland. It was
particularly interesting to have him explain just why it was a good idea to
pipe sewage all the way to Wetalla. Apparently Toowoomba previously had a poor
record of letting too much nitrogen and phosphorus flow into the Murray-Darling
river system, and was a major contributor to the serious problem of blue-green
algae. Major changes to Wetalla’s processing method mean that we can now be
proud of the clean water that we send down the river. John also brought up the
subject of increased “hard-pan” – the increasing area of land under hard
surfaces, such as buildings, roads, and driveways – which results in increased
stormwater run-off. This will affect the wetlands site.
The Wyreema plant still has a function. It receives the sewage from
Wyreema and Cambooya, and sends it on to Wetalla, so a small corner of the site
will continue to be involved in this. TRC’s decision is still to be made as to
what can be done with the remaining area, which consists of a large area of
open land, the old sewage ponds, and the dam which now collects Wyreema’s
stormwater run-off. The stormwater dam
will continue to attract birds, but it is still to be decided to what extent
TRC might feel able to support the restoration of the area to the high-quality
wetland it was, when the sewage treatment ponds were in use.
These shallower ponds provided excellent shallow-water feeding-ground
for wading birds. We could also see that unlike the steeper-sided stormwater
dam, they provided an excellent habitat for rushes and sedges, which in turn
provided nesting sites and shelter for birds.
Members discussed several issues with John, including the TRC’s
perceived need to remove sludge from the ponds as part of the process of
restoring the land to an acceptable state. John pointed out that sewage works
are subject to requirements in this regard, similar to those for mines.
Members queried the necessity of this, considering that birds had been
using the habitat, without apparent harm, for 20 years. They also suggested
that increasing the pond area, and therefore the seepage area, could be a way
of contributing a local solution to the problem of reduced groundwater recharge
because of rapidly increasing hard-surfacing of the land. As the increasing
local difficulty of accessing bore water demonstrates, it may be that sending
all that potential recharge water away downstream is not the happiest solution.
Meanwhile, the birds would benefit from the resultant wetlands. Thank you to
both John and Mick, for a morning which was both enjoyable, and left us feeling
much better-informed about the Wyreema Wetlands issues.
Visiting by Yourself
It is possible to look at the wetland’s birds from
outside the fence at any time. This only gives a view of one of the ex-sewage
ponds, but because it is shallow, it is the best one for wading birds. The
deeper stormwater dam can only be seen from inside the fence, but you can ONLY
enter the precinct if you follow certain Toowoomba Regional Council
requirements. If you would like to do it, would you please contact Mick Atzeni
first to find out about them? It would be helpful to the success of the
project, if you could let Mick know of any birds you see there. His email
address is: tiddalac@gmail.com
(Report by Patricia Gardner)
Birds, Frogs and Dragonflies List compiled by Al Young
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| Yellow rumped Thornbill (or 'butter bum') having a bath at Wreema (photo: Al Young) |
Birds – Pacific
Black Duck, Grey Teal, Straw-necked Ibis, White-faced Heron, Black-shouldered
Kite, White-headed (Black-winged) Stilt (1),
Masked Lapwing, Black-fronted Dotterel (8), Rock Dove (Feral Pigeon),
Crested Pigeon, Nankeen Kestrel, Brown Falcon (Hodgson Cr), Cockatiel,
Red-rumped Parrot, Pale-headed Rosella, Yellow-rumped Thornbill, Grey
Butcherbird, Pied Butcherbird, Australian Magpie, Black-faced Cuckoo Shrike (Hodgson
Cr), Willie Wagtail, Magpie-lark, Torresian Crow, Golden-headed Cisticola,
Zebra Finch and Australian Pipit. (Taxonomy follows the International
Ornithological Congress, 6.3, 2016)
Dragonflies along
Hodgson Creek, Cambooya:
There was a considerable amount of dragonfly activity,
mostly associated with ‘begetting’, near the remaining pools of water in
Hodgson Creek. Males were actively patrolling their territories with some males
and females flying in tandem thus allowing the females to deposit eggs into the
water. I managed to identify four different species of dragonflies with a
further two or three species of medium-sized dragonflies unidentified because
they didn’t perch to allow a photo to be taken. Interestingly there were no
damselflies present.
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| Australian Emperor (Hemianax papuensis) Male and female flying in tandem |
 |
| Blue Skimmer (Orthetrum caledonicum) |
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| Scarlet Percher (Diplacodes haematodes) No dark markings on a scarlet abdomen |
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| Wandering (Common) Percher (Diplacodes bipunctata). Note: dark markings on a reddish orange abdomen |
(Photos by Al Young)
THE GRASSLAND AT WYREEMA WETLAND
(Article and photo by Patricia Gardner)
At our March meeting, Rod Hobson and Bruce Lawrie told us that the
vegetation around the ponds might include some good quality Queensland
Bluegrass grassland, a Regional Ecosystem type (11.8.11), which is classified
as “of concern”. Because of the dry weather, they found it difficult to be sure
when they visited, a few weeks ago. They remarked on the importance of
grasslands as ecosystems and the tendency for them to be undervalued in
comparison with treed ecosystems. They expressed the hope that if further
investigation showed the Wyreema wetland to have value as a grassland, any
planting of trees would be carefully restricted to prevent damaging it.
On our outing, we found it similarly difficult to get a good idea of the
full range of plants there, though because of the recent rain it was looking a
little healthier than when Rod and Bruce saw it. Given that many of our local
grassland plants either die back to their perennial underground roots in dry
times, or have seed that won’t germ-inate until good rain comes, there are
likely to be more species there than we saw.
 |
| Blushing bindweed (Convolvulus erubescens |
There was certainly plenty of Queensland bluegrass
Dichanthium sericeum there. Other grasses included Yabila grass (star
grass) Panicum queenslandicum. There were very few native trees, but we
saw Mountain coolibah, Eucalyptus orgadophila and Sally Wattle, Acacia
salicina. These species, and their very sparse distribution, are both
typical of R.E. 11.8.11.
Healthy
grasslands always contain a good population of
wildflowers.
We saw blushing bindweed Convolvulus erubescens; sensitive plant Neptunia gracilis;
plover Daisy Leiocarpa
brevicompta; tah vine Boerhavia dominii; yellowtop daisy Senecio pinnatifolius
(AKA Senecio
lautus) and maloga bean Vigna
vexillata (the little
yellow pea). We also saw a good scattering of Austral
cornflower Rhaponticum australe (AKA Stemmacantha
australe), the vulnerable
plant mentioned by Mick on
Friday night. These little grassland forbs are all good
butterfly host plants.
