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Convenors are
Roger & Meredith Briggs,

phone 5752 2080.
email: rbriggs@netc.net.au


The Buffalo Sallow Wattle only grows on Mt. Buffalo and burnt plants are already sprouting. This Spring, the wattles on Mt. Buffalo should give a riot of colour.

The Group:

Mt. Buffalo Field Naturalist Group is a special interest group under the auspices of the Field Naturalist Club of Victoria. It was formed in 1998 after the FNCV conducted a week of natural history studies on Mt. Buffalo to commemorate the centenary of the National Park. It was particularly significant because the Field Naturalists had a large role in the formation of the National Park in 1898.

During the visit one hundred years later, some leading naturalists and keen amateurs studied the flora, mammals, birds, insects, fungi and lichen in the park. A report was subsequently published in the Victorian Field Naturalist Magazine - in an edition that was devoted to Mt. Buffalo National Park.

Since then the Group has published a Vegetation Map of the Park, and held events to further study the plants and fungi of the mountain. Some long term monitoring of vegetation is being undertaken. An effort is being made to photograph all the plants on the mountain - over 800 species.

 

General:
Only five days after the January fires, which saw 98% of the Mt. Buffalo National Park burnt, the first epicormic shoots were seen on the sides of trees, and the long process of regeneration had began.

Visitor numbers over recent months have reflected the enormous local interest in this demonstration of the resilience that is occurring on our door-step. Why do some trees regenerate differently from others? What longer-term effects will the fire have on the vegetation mix on the mountains. How do lyre-birds survive the fire, and what food is there for them to eat afterwards? What about the insects, the fish in the mountain streams, and the endangered spotted tree frog?

 

Members of the group studying the grasses on the Buffalo Plateau in Feb. 2002. The many species of grasses provide a challenge in identification.

 

NOTICES

Members of the group and the public are welcome to pass on any observations they make within the park. These may be sent to the convenors by email

 

 

Field Naturalist Club of Victoria (we are a designated special interest group of this Club)
Their address is www.vicnet.net.au/~fncv/