Mulloon Consulting (MC) have had a busy and productive period over the tail end of Summer and going into Autumn. We’re pleased to welcome new team member, Dr Sophie Hall-Aspland since the last eNews. Sophie is the Project Manager for our Landscape Function Toolkit (LiFT) project. Sophie has hit the ground running, including an internal planning day that she facilitated at Mulloon to progress our work on this project.
The water stewardship program with WaterNSW continues to gather momentum as Erin Healy and I have been busy engaging with stakeholders in the Sydney Drinking Water Catchment. We are also in the final stages of a document that will be utilised for communicating with catchment stakeholders and provide critical information about the impact of landscape rehydration projects. Thanks to Dr Laura Fisher particularly for all of the work that she has put into co-authoring, coordinating and editing this document, as well as Stuart Naylor from WaterNSW for all of his input and support. Laura also coordinated a systems tools and games workshop with BOHO Interactive which a few of us participated in as the next step towards developing some of these tools to use with landholders and other stakeholders for building capacity in landscape rehydration.
We are extremely pleased to have completed the in-stream works associated with the Molonglo River project at ‘Carwoola’. This project has been over five years in the making, and it is really pleasing to get to construction phase. Jack Smart, who led the project, including most of the work on the detailed designs and regulatory approvals, should be very proud of what has been achieved. At times the construction conditions were particularly challenging, however Jack reliably worked through everything with the support of Peter Hazell, Max Brunswick, and Mitch Lennon. Further work on the floodplain earthworks (including constructed wetlands for Green and Golden Bellfrog habitat) will be undertaken in April and May. We also thank the Purves family of Carwoola and NSW Environment Trust for their support in turning this project into a reality.
Tony Wells and Henry Burt have been working on a project utilising the Agronomeye platform for a client with three properties (one in Victoria, and two in NSW). We are utilising the Agronomeye platform for the initial landscape rehydration assessment process for these properties. The product has come a long way since our initial pilot last year and we congratulate Stu, Tim and the team for its ongoing development.
A number of other consulting projects have been undertaken from initial site inspections through to regulatory approval documentation and applications, as well as planning for some upcoming construction projects. We have also been busy with Grant opportunities, with much thanks to Nolani McColl for the huge amount of work that she has put into these.
The MC team have also been busy delivering a number of Learning Programs around the country, including those associated with the ongoing Communities of Practice Program (CoPP) and First Nations Water Stewardship program. Our team have also been completing cultural training over the last few months with sessions delivered by Kate Harriden and Nicola Lambert from Catchment Studio as well as AIATSIS self-paced training.
I’ve also managed to get out and about a bit over the last few months, including to attend the Wilmot Field Days with Carolyn and Louis, as well as a gathering of Hovells Creek Landcare (main photo at top of page at this event ©Nviro Media) and seeing the work we’ve completed there, presenting to a group of farmers at Harden thanks to Sam and the team at FarmLab; and just last week to the Central West to support Penny Cooper, Sharni Pike and Tony Wells with the delivery of a couple of Field Days (pictured right) and a Boots on Ground Day
Jono Forrest
General Manager
Mulloon Consulting
