The Yarra Link Project would like to thank the team at  Biosis for their hard work at providing a full ecological and cultural survey of our Heyington location. We are very excited to move foward with the valuable knowledge and want to share a bit of what we’ve learned here.

We were very pleased to discover a number of indigenous plants already making their home on the site and providing the Yarra Link project with a place to begin work. The Diagram below details the indigenous plants found on the Yarra Link Project’s river-side location.

We have also received some valuable information regarding the cultural significance of a number of the plants that call the Yarra Link Project their home, below is what Biosis had to say regarding the use of some of these plants.

“Indigenous people of the Melbourne region used a diverse range of plants as a food source, for tools, adhesives, medicine and for cultural purposes. Following the removal of indigenous peoples from their land  early in Australia’s history much of the information regarding indigenous use of plants has been gained from early European accounts and often the use of precise species can be difficult to establish (Gott 2008).

There are a number of plants currently present on the site that would have been commonly used by indigenous people in the area (reference):
River Red Gum trees were an important plant for indigenous people in the Melbourne area. The bark was used to make canoes, shelters, shields and containers. The sap was used to seal burns and was mixed with water to treat diarrhoea. The leaves were used in an aromatic steam bath to treat a range of ailments.
Black Wattle was an important source of gum. A sweet drink was made from the gum and flower nectar when dissolved in water. The gum was also used as a resin.
The leaves of Common Tussock-grass and Kangaroo Grass were used as string for nets, bags baskets and mats. The seeds from Kangaroo Grass were also ground into flour.
Prior to European settlement of the area the site may have contained a range of species that would have been used by local indigenous groups.
Plants with starchy tubers were commonly eaten and formed a significant portion of the diet of indigenous people (Gott 2008). Plants of this type that may have occurred within the study area include:
· Chocolate –lily Arthropodium spp.
· Marsh Club-sedge Bolboschoenus medianus
· Bulbine Lily Bulbine bulbosa
· Cranes-bill Geranium spp.
· Milkmaids Burchardia umbelata
· Common Reed Phragmites australis
· Plains Yam-Daisy Microseris scapigera
· Water Ribbons Triglochin spp.

Other local plant parts were utilised such as the berries of Spreading Flax-lily Dianella revoluta which were picked and eaten and the flowers of Native Violet Viola hederacea were picked and eaten raw.
Local aromatic plants such as mint Mentha spp. and Sneezeweed Centipeda spp. were widely used medicinally by indigenous groups. Materials with a high tannin content such as Eucalyptus sap were used to treat burns and wounds and local Mistletoe species Amyea sppm. were used in aromatic steam baths.
Several species commonly found in this area have known uses as materials for tools, adhesives and weapons. The stems of a number of species such as Poon’ort Carex tereticaulis and Spiny-headed Mat-rush Lomandra longifolia were spit and were woven into bags, baskets or nets. Blackwood Acacia melanoxylon was often used to make shields clubs or spear throwers.”

Reference:

Yarra Link Project: Flora and Fauna Assessment, Biosis Pty Ltd, Melbourne. Dec 2014.

Thank you to those who came to take part in our 2nd official Yarra Link Project meet and greet picnic. It was lovely to see some new faces and gain some valuable new ideas and opinions for the good of the project. We hope to continue growing our monthly picnic and look forward to next month’s gathering!

This is a call-out to any and all artists who appreciate a natural setting for their creative expressions.  The Yarra Link Project hopes to give a creative mind/s the opportunity to take advantage of our highly visible location and exhibit an art installation that will attract attention and give the public something to visually consider.  Ideally we would like to see a focus on the principles that guide the YLP (Yarra Link Project) however  we are a very open minded group of people who ultimately would like to see our natural space utilized for artistic expression. Please send any proposals or ideas to our contact page here at the Yarra Link Project or check out our ad in Creative Spaces.

A prime focus of the Yarra Link Project is the development of technologies suited to conservation, we like to consider it as high tech combined with biological efficiency, Eco-tech.

In many cases, nature has already done the work for us, yet we often underestimate the sophistication of ecological solutions.

Eco-tech can be leveraged to a number of aims

• land improvement – particularly soil quality and biodiversity
• carbon negative end points
• self-propagating and renewing systems
• energy conversion into useful forms

For example, let’s compare two technologies to capture CO₂ with solar energy:

1. solar formic acid generator
2. trees as carbon collectors

The engineered solution involves manufacturing, transporting and maintaining a CO₂ sequestration infrastructure.  These processes all have their own, generally carbon emitting, costs.

If we consider the properties of an ideal carbon dioxide gathering technology, trees (a naturally engineered solution) have distinct advantages:

• convert water and CO2 into complex carbohydrates, useful proteins and even medicines.
• self propagating system without need to transport to site
• can be “installed” in a variety of environments.
• existing harvesting infrastructure
• produce high quality building material (wood)

The theme of utilising, adapting and improving the functioning of such systems is a driving principle of how we do Eco-tech. We hope to apply this technology on site for management of energy, water, fuel and more complex endpoints including biodiversity, complex self-sustaining systems and human enjoyment (you might know such systems as… gardens).

Further reading:

• Allan Savory TED talk