Article by Kaye Rodden

Our Barrabool Hills Landcare Group AGM was again held at the Gnarwarre Tennis Pavilion on 21st August, and thanks to the Gnarwarre CFA for once again making this venue available to us.

Over 40 community members attended the evening, which was preceded by our now traditional wine and cheese offering. Thank you to relatively new member Ken Harrison AM and Chair of the Royal Botanic Gardens of Victoria (RBGV), who organised for the Chief Conservation Botanist from the RBGV, Neville Walsh, to attend as our guest speaker.

Neville provided a fascinating insight into the threatened species recovery program at the gardens, from collecting and cataloguing samples from inland Australia on camel back, to trekking the Alpine National Park. The diversity of Australia’s native flora was definitely the centre piece, but what was extraordinary was that in a time when we are always talking about extinctions, Neville is regularly discovering and identifying new species. Our sincere thanks to Neville for sharing his knowledge with our community.

The formalities of the AGM were presided over by the Chair of the Geelong Landcare Network, Peter Stray.

The newly elected Executive of the group are:
Kaye Rodden, President
Jim Seager, Vice President
Joan Anson, Secretary
Anthony Jones, Treasurer
Geelong Landcare Network representatives, Maddie Steel and Geoff Anson
Executive members, Heike Dunn, Ian Kelly, Tim Trottier, Christa and Trevor Jones and Judy Cohn
Newsletter Editor, Tim Harte
Our sincere thanks to retiring executive member Sally Jones and welcome new member, Maddie Steel.