I learned something new about insect tootsies today.
arolium
Month: March 2023
green and pink
Around here, you can’t swing a quoll (not that you would) without hitting a park or green space. Mature trees, creeks, and playgrounds abound, which provide huge quality-of-life enhancements to residents, whether they realise it or not.
Brisbane has, on average, 54 per cent green cover, though, as in most cities, affluent areas have more mature trees than poorer suburbs. (In comparison, Melbourne had just 23 per cent total tree cover in 2020, and Sydney had 34 per cent. All three cities lost green cover between 2013 and 2020.)
Needless to say, I’ve been spending time every day in the nearby green spaces, mostly just sitting and breathing it all in. Today, there was also a little sketching in a pink cafe with a fancy chandelier. It’s good to mix it up.
Trichonephila edulis
There are sooooo many golden orb weavers (Trichonephila edulis) here in the Australian sub-tropics at this time of year; every garden sports half a dozen or more, it seems. Their tangled webs are large, strong and sticky, so one needs to be careful when walking outside in the dark. The spider’s bite is not venomous, though it can cause pain and swelling. Perhaps you’d like to try biting back: edulis means edible. The spider has apparently been considered a delicacy in Papua New Guinea and New Caledonia, plucked by the legs from its web and lightly roasted over an open fire.
The koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) on the other hand, is much harder to spot. So I was pretty happy when all my neck-craning paid off this afternoon, down by the creek.
nature shelf
I’m back in the sub-tropics with the grandkids. It’s hot and humid. Hopefully it’ll rain in the next few days and cool things down a bit. Also: time to start a new sketchbook!
last day with sister
If you ever go to Local Press Café at the Kingston Foreshore, try the “Crêpe of turmeric, rice flour & coconut milk with spiced cauliflower, tamarind-masala sweet potato, tomato & lentil chutney, herbs, pomegranate & cashews (v, gf)”. Mm mmmm.
Grevillea oleoides
My sister lives on a bush block, and there is absolutely no shortage of trees here (mostly eucalypts and acacias). But I still like to add to the assortment when I visit. It started when Mum died and we planted creeping boobialla, Myoporum parvifolium, in her honour (she had breast cancer — get it?) When Dad passed he got a Grevillea ‘Ned Kelly’, to celebrate his love of Australia folk legends. We don’t need the excuse of someone dying to plant a tree; now we do it each time I come.
Mulligans Flat
Last night we went on a guided night hike at Mulligans Flat, a 1285ha (3175 acre) predator-fenced woodland sanctuary near Canberra. Several native species have been successfully reintroduced here, including the Eastern Quoll, a marsupial about the size of a house cat, and the Eastern Bettong, a little macropod, both of which we spotted. We also heard Stone Bush-curlews and saw Superb Parrots, Eastern Rosellas, Sulphur-crested Cockatoos, Eastern Grey Kangaroos, Red-necked Wallabies, Swamp Wallabies, many Common Brushtail Possums and orb weaver spiders, and one teeny frog. It was awesome!
Rusten House
Rusten House began life in 1862 as Queanbeyan’s second hospital. It accommodated 16 patients, with care provided by Matron Rusten and her husband. When a larger hospital opened nearby in the 1930s, Rusten House was converted into nurses’ quarters.
Heritage-listed, beautifully-conserved Rusten House is now a contemporary art and cultural facility. Today we attended the opening of a small but impactful exhibition of feminist posters dating from the 70s and 80s, some of which I remember from my activist youth. Lunch was served in the garden and we enjoyed the company of a friend and her daughter. I snuck away to sketch and missed the speeches.
Wagga Wagga
Ted Egan famously sang that you don’t call Wagga Wagga “Wagga”, but it seems that most people do. We loved our day trip to this thriving inland city. So good to see Astrid and Gregg again, this time in their new home.
Wallabia bicolor
Namadgi National Park is a protected area in the south-west of the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). It occupies 106,095 hectares (262,166 acres), approximately 46 percent of the ACT’s land area.
Declared a national park in 1984, Namadgi National Park has helped protect the biodiversity of the ACT. Eighty percent of the area burned in the Orroral Valley bushfire in early 2020; recovery is ongoing. I’m not sure if the Square Rock trail was in the burn area, but to my eyes today, the place was looking pretty good!
hashiworks 