Site

The Site

The 110 acre (44 ha) forest was a bare site in 1998 when it was planted with more than 60,000 trees. It comprises a small section established as a plantation that has since been successfully converted into a revegetation program. Mature native hardwood trees on the undulating land house native wildlife that are even more abundant in the complex and intensive revegetation program of the steep degraded lands across the balance of the property.

Located at the southern extreme of the Murray Darling System catchment, the site had previously been used for extensive grazing on unimproved pasture for decades and included some land slips and active tunnel erosion. Erosion has been mediated and the worst sites actively rehabilitated in general accordance with current land and environment policy. The environmental rehabilitation project is regarded as an example of appropriate revegetation for parts of neighbouring lands where some areas of degraded native pastures has resulted from past farming practices. 

Such steep or erodible parcels of land has limited agricultural potential unless improved nutrition and herd management is practiced. Reforestation is a suitable land use that offers benefits lost by some past practices. The general area where the reforested land is located has been assessed in land capability studies as Silurian/Devonian sediments of moderate slope or moderately steep slope, as shown in the image. A more detailed soil capability has also been published. Within that general description, the specific site (ringed) might be better classified as largely comprised of minor granite intrusions in mainly Silurian mudstone of steep slopes that express as sodic duplex soils with a shallow topsoil over dense clay that can create highly erodible slopes after clearing.

The value of the revegetation program has been recognised for research, training and education purposes of the University of Melbourne, by wildlife enthusiasts who have spotted communities of echidna, wombats, eastern grey kangaroos, black wallaby, kookaburra, rosella and multiple other species. It has also been acknowledged by the electricity suppliers in the relocation of power lines away from the site to avoid risking loss of trees and interruption of wildlife movement. All power for operations within the site is off-grid.

The Falvey Forest Site Before Planting and In-preparation on Mildly Undulating Lands