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.