Darling Range Branch meeting, February 2012 “The Nature of Japan” was the subject of our first meeting for 2012 and it was presented jointly by Hirono and Mike Griffiths. Following their recent visit to Japan in October 2011, Mike and Hirono conducted us on a travelogue from a Naturalists’ viewpoint. ...
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Contains reports from meetings and excursions
Amazingly it was quite a horrible day, with clouds, murky water and blustery conditions. But we still had a very profitable morning and it just became a summer beach sweep. We were very lucky again to have Dr Anne Brearley volunteer her time again, and she started the children off ...
Read more →After the AGM, Anne Brearley gave us an interesting talk about Norfolk Island, which she visited in 2011. The tall pines planted at Cottesloe are our connection with this small Pacific island. The first Norfolk Island Pines in Cottesloe were probably the ones planted in John Street in 1917 by ...
Read more →June Butcher, founder of the Kanyana Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre and our member and guest speaker for the general meeting, gave us an insight into the aims and functioning of the rehab centre now located in the now very well rehabilitated wildlife centre at 120 Gilchrist Rd, Lesmurdie. The main thrust ...
Read more →Dr Kayley Usher, from the CSIRO, was our guest speaker for the October meeting and presented a talk entitled ‘How marvellous microbes made our world’. We were introduced into the world of the microscopic and sub-microscopic through a series of images and were presented with some interesting aspects of microbial ...
Read more →Some 20 intrepid DRB members and visitors travelled to Twink Smurthwaite’s ‘Topsy’ garden in Boya on Sunday September 18th – ‘intrepid’ because the day promised to be truly equinoxal. About half of those people continued to inspect rehabilitation work by the Helena River Catchment Group (HRCG) along the Scott Street/Pumpback ...
Read more →Eric McCrum, past President and active member of the Darling Range Branch, presented a talk on grasshoppers entitled ‘The bizarre world of grasshoppers’. Eric’s talk was well illustrated from his extensive collection of slides, a selection of which showed the wide morphology and colourful varieties of grasshoppers from WA. Eric ...
Read more →Armed with scoop nets and shod in Wellington boots, a small army of young naturalists and their parents waded into the shallows of Bibra Lake and searched for living things in the water. After good rains this winter, the lake was full, and the water was full of insect larvae ...
Read more →Although showers were forecast, the morning was beautifully warm and sunny, allowing about 30 members and visitors to enjoy a leisurely walk along the slope of the Darling Scarp above Lesmurdie Falls. Many people were surprised to see how many of the shrubs in the heath land were already in ...
Read more →Karakamia Sanctuary is a 275ha piece of land, fenced off against cats and foxes, near Chidlow in the Jarrah forest east of Perth. It is owned and run by the Australian Wildlife Conservancy. With the lack of predators, and the introduction of some native animals from elsewhere in the south-west, ...
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