Friends meet

The Friends of Canadian Corridor (FoCC) recently met to continue to fight to save Canadian State Forest and the blocks near Mount Helen that are currently in issue. The friends have also been working on the Woodman’s Hill Strategy Plan and ensuring the bio-link remains intact. More on the FoCC here.

Minutes of a recent meeting of the Friends of the Canadian Corridor prepared by Linda Zibell. We shared the following news, activities and plans.

The Friends have had correspondence from Treasury and Finance: the ex-plantation land is crown land. The entire area of ex-plantation land is still known overall as the “Canadian Forest”.

The draft brochure is developing nicely with a number of additions. Jeff Rootes has done a fantastic job, and Bob Hartmann now has the website up and running, not yet live, but soon to be. Possible future developments include a suggestion box, the brochure, a timeline of the Friends’ history that builds with our activities as we go.

Linda Zibell and Jeff Rootes went to Sovereign Hill to meet with the Operations Manager who is broadly supportive of our cause and anticipates Sovereign Hill will be right behind us. 

The federally recognised Great Eastern Bio link which spans three states leads from north Queensland down the Great Divide, through the Creswick Forest, on to the Canadian Forest and the ex-plantation land then on to the Pyrenees.  The bio link is important for species protection, biodiversity and movement of species southward as adjustment is made in response to Climate Change. Jeff Rootes wrote to Council to ask that the bio-link be recognised and Linda Zibell assisted in finalising it. On the Friends’ behalf we provided feedback to Council about possible impacts of industrial type activity that could interfere with the viability of the biolink at a proposed development  on Woodman’s Hill.  On Wednesday Linda Zibell spoke to the decision to thank Council Strategic Planning for acknowledging the biolink and also about retaining a rural feel at this important entrance. The biolink will now hopefully be identified in the Woodman’s Hill Master Plan and in the altered plan for the development. Council have agreed on a buffer zone to protect the bio-link, depending on the activity proposed.         

The Field Naturalists have kindly begun a “Photo Point Survey” to determine the returning indigenous vegetation. Eleven points have been set up which be returned to in one year and then five years. Three are in native vegetation areas, 5 are in re-vegetation areas.

Meeting held between Jeff Rootes, Linda Zibell and Indigenous historical experts from the University – Professor Ian Clark and Dr Fred Cahir, to explore potential historical Aboriginal evidence for the ex-plantation land.  Professor Clark will look into Wathaurung names in the forest area.  These meetings continue to extend and deepen our knowledge – socially, historically, geographically, and economically.  

Thoughts towards action

 a) We would like more organisations to formally declare support for the project by email or letter – such as local schools, recreational groups. We would appreciate volunteers to go to local organisations and personally request such letters.

b) We will ask the City of Ballarat how they protect and administer environmental processes at present and explore other council websites to see how they deal with environmental issues and protection processes and whether they have Environmental officers.

c) We are also looking into getting some aerial photos taken of the land as vegetation returns.

d) We are looking for a soils and wider geological profile of the ex-plantation land.

e) We discussed a forum for next March to both provide a summary of local and big picture issues such as the Great Eastern Ranges Biolink. Booths and information sharing will be a feature again as these were very successful last time. We hope to videotape it this time.

The attendance of other Friends is warmly welcomed and very helpful in deciding directions at these meetings, we hope more people can attend in future

That’s all for now from your Friends of the Canadian Corridor co-convenors! Linda Zibell, Jeff Rootes and Bob Hartmann

All the best