The beauty of the brushpack

One year after the Brushpack Workshop at Bimbimbie Farm, the compacted land above the dam is showing healthy signs of regeneration.

Back on 4 November 2021, Joe Skuse led an enthusiastic group in a Brushpack Workshop at Bimbimbie Farm, the property of Alex and Charlie Bogle, in the Capertee Valley. The event was Land Studio, an artist-led land restoration camp. Alex and Charlie, new owners of the property, had just fenced off a degraded site for regeneration, consisting of a cluster of dams they wanted to return to a more natural state. There were many areas of bare and compacted earth around these dams and some unsightly erosion gullies, most likely caused by overgrazing in the past. 

On that day we created three brushpacks from harvested olive tree prunings, melaleuca and wattle. They all straddled erosion areas, and in one case the brush was woven through short stakes. As Joe explained, these piles of brush would protect exposed areas from the elements, slow water flows, hold moisture, and provide refuge and habitat for little critters, whose presence would also contribute to the capture of nutrients. 

Almost a year to the day later, on 12 November 2022, Laura Fisher and Peter Hazell from Mulloon Institute revisited the site. We were immediately struck by how the area had been transformed by the rains and the rest. The dams are now wetlands with flourishing aquatic vegetation surrounded by healthier stands of grass and other plants. Many erosion spots were stabilising, though the floods had certainly made their mark on some gullied areas – highlighting where a future workshop might take place.  

We inspected the brushpacks closely, all of which had remained firmly in place despite the powerful flows they must have experienced in the last year! Their height had reduced substantially, so they were now dense snakes hugging the ground. A variety of plants were sprouting around them, taking advantage of the captured moisture, sediment and fertility. We wondered whether in one case where more melaluca brush was used, there was less plant growth – melaluca may have similar allelopathic properties to eucalyptus (which means that the biochemical compounds it releases can inhibit the germination and growth of other species of plant). But it was also a steeper slope with no topsoil at all, so perhaps it will take a bit longer.  

We also noted the effectiveness of combining coir matting with rocks in a steep gullied area the Bogles are repairing. We could clearly see that where the coir had captured some sediment passing through, plants were sprouting courageously, whereas where there were only rocks and boulders this hadn’t happened.  

We hope to run a follow-up workshop at Bimbimbie Farm in the future, in which we treat some of these gullies with sequences of mini-weirs using a combination of earth, rock and coir. As a fenced off regeneration site that is easily accessible, it lends itself well to being a demonstration site for others in the Capertee Valley aiming to implement low-cost solutions to their degradation issues!  

Brushpacks being installed, November 2021. Image: Alex Wisser.

A close-up of the brushpacks one year after installation – slowing water flow and providing habitat for small critters as the soils around them regenerate.

Peter Hazell, Principal Landscape Planner at Mulloon Institute revisiting Bimbimbie Farm in November 2022, one year after the initial Brushpack Workshop.

Brushpacks being installed in November 2021 as part of the Brushpack Workshop. Image: Alex Wisser.

This workshop and monitoring process forms part of the Mulloon Institute’s Landscape Rehydration Capacity building project, which is supported by the NSW Government through the Environmental Trust.