ANPS finds how to make sand at Nadgigomar South

The secret of this process is revealed at the end of the post (after a big fat hint early on).

ANPS refers to this area as Nadgigomar South while the NSW National Parks mob have decided - for no reason obvious to me - to call it the Durran Durra section.  These two maps come from the Management Plan (MP).

 Given that the three sections are totally disconnected I can't see why they are not separate reserves (especially since they are managed through different offices of NSW NPS).  But then I can rarely understand the actions of that 'organisation'.

Here is detail of the Durran Durra section: we started on Euradux Rd; did the length of the Durran Durra trail, followed a trail bike gouge (the red bit - see below) down to the Cable Trail and followed that and the Cable Link Trail back to the cars,

Here is a sample of the habitat of the area we visited.

It was very sandy.  The were lots of tracks in the sand including horses, dogs and deer.  The commonest track was this:

 Which leads to this.

 As indicated in the preamble this matter will be covered further at the end of the post.  In the meantime lets have a look at some flowers, beginning with a former Coronidium oxylepis ssp. lanatum.

Also well past its former glory was a Patersonia sericea: 2 other species of this genus were found but were 'leaf-only' and thus not photographed.

The only bean in flower was Mirbelia platyloboides.

This one had obviously been in flower for a while!

A 'normal' Boronia algida ,,,,

... and a 'special' (or perhaps 'differently presenting') Boronia algida.  There was some speculation about the elements composing the sand!

Bright yellow Acacia terminalis was the most common flowering vegetation.

I was advised that this colouration was unusual and the creamy colour seen in the foreground here was more typical.  The yellow variant is also evident for contrast.

A lot of A. decurrens was also evident, but none further advanced than this.

There was some speculation whether this was native or escapee, but it seemed quite widespread and the MP doesn't identify any settlement, which might have formed a site of infection, in the area.

The higher country was well endowed with Allocasuarina littoralis and I found these chewings on the ground.  Unfortunately we didn't observe any Glossy Black-Cockatoos,

Here are some unchewed 'cones'.

Towards the end of the Cable Link Trail we found these flowers as well as some more cones.

Three species of Pomaderris were identified (but not the P. delicata mentioned in the MP).  This P. ledifolia was very close to flowering.

P. ferruginea was bit further off.

Banksia marginata was evident but clearly past flowering.

There was quite an amount of Persoonia linearis with fruits but I thought the red bark more interesting.

There were a lot of large Eucalypts including this one (of unrecorded species) with crinkled bark.

Judging by the number of scribbles I judged this to be E. rossii.

A huge E. viminalis.

Birds weer constantly heard, but rarely seen.  This White-throated Treecreeper posed nicely and, as it was free from red on the face, was a male.

There were no photographable insects around, but much evidence of termite activity, forming mounds around dead timber that had fallen ....

.. or even stayed upright.  This mound was close to 2m high.

Having dealt with invertebrates (ie things with no backbone) let us move to what I will term sinecerebrates (ie things with no brain).  The MP comments:

"...off-road motorcycle activity is causing vegetation loss and trail formation in a number of areas and has the potential to result in localised erosion and siltation. This is particularly of concern in the centre of the Durran Durra section, where riders are preventing revegetation of a cleared valley floor and have created a large number of hill climbs on the adjacent steep slope."

These two little charmers rode right through our group.  The second one had a number plate, but unfortunately it wasn't legible in the photograph taken from behind.

This one gave me a cheery wave as he rode past the clear sign.

The MP refers to gating the entry points to prevent this vermin entering the Reserve.  Unfortunately with mental pathology, a 4x4, and a snatch strap gates can be modified.

This was at the Western end of the Cable Fire Trail.  Hopefully someone will realise that regulation without enforcement is pointless and put more patrols into the area (or at least put a few webcams around to record the miscreants and then prosecute them)..  To help them come to this realisation I phoned the number for Braidwood office given in the MP: needless to say no-one was there so I rang one of the other office numbers and gave them a message which was hopefully passed on.