March 2025 Field Day with BMV @ Lot 50 Kanyanyapilla

Cooeeee Biodiversiteers!

This month, as the End Times loom on a far horizon, BMV has decided to ignore all the noise and palaver and carrot-topped foaming at the mouth. Instead, We’re Going To Celebrate how good it is to live south of the Onkaparinga! And, most especially, in and around Willunga Basin, which cradles us all. I’m so happy I feel like I might cry at any a moment…

“Why not!”, they cried, and who am I to argue. But first let me tell you why. Just this last week, Lot 50 Kanyanyapilla - or L50K as we have come to know it - celebrated its 10th anniversary. Ten years since our very own Dr Gavin Malone stepped onto his newly purchased and nearly naked 40 acre sandhill, with a bit of swamp at its feet and two horses roaming free. Now, 731 litres of sweat later, it’s rapidly turning into one of the Biodiversity Hotspots of the regional region and is a splendidiferous example to us all of how ‘what was’ can become ‘what is’. What used to be A Complete Unknown has now gone eclectic.

“When?”, they cried. Sunday March 2, I replied, at the corner of Branson and Pethick Roads, McLaren Vale. Starting at 9.00. Finishing at 10.47, approximately.

So, the way we plan to celebrate is by doing a bit of work and having a bit of chat about things and, later, chowing down on a bit of a feed. Nothing too complicated, and nothing to kill this time out. (That will be next month.)

We’ll do a bit of maintenance and watering of our previous Branson Road planting, which has endured the driest year since Noah was a geriatric; we’ll plant and water a handful of swamp-edge plants that were originally to be planted by another mob but when China invaded Brazil next week it all fell through; we’ll marvel at a photographic exhibition of the changes at L50K over time (and, if you’ve never been there, it’s a sight to see); we’ll wander around the site with Gavin to get an insiders knowledge and become more learned still; we’ll learn to spot and pull out Flatweed coz that’s what it needs; and we’ll learn a little about the Maslin Creek Reed Swamp, ecological wonderland that it is, and about BMV’s Maslin Creek Revive programme which, between now and then, is going to make other creek owners across the state groan with envy.

So much to do and see. I’ll be going home for a nap when it’s all over, especially if I get stuck into Gavin’s supply of sparkling shiraz over a plate of Gerry’s vegies.

On technical matters:

• please park carefully along the road verges from the corner of Branson and Pethick Roads
• wear clothes suitable for being outside; and
• register for a snag by clicking on the ‘I’m Coming For a Snag’ button below.

It’s always good to celebrate stuff, especially on a Sunday morning coz then you have time to have a second celebration in the afternoon if you get really fired up.

I wish there was more that I could say but there isn’t. So that’s that.

See you there!

Cheers,

Geoff H