Скачать или смотреть Minimise disturbance when walking and weeding: bush regeneration skills

Many plants have evolved with disturbances such as fire –It’s what triggers the resilience response within fire-adapted ecosystems, what prompts the plants to resprout and germinate.
But immediately after a large disturbance like fire, the ecosystem is vulnerable, and further disturbance can easily destroy regenerating plants.
Once your site has been declared safe, and the plants have had enough time (and rainfall) to reveal the first stages of recovery, you can go in.
Tread carefully so you don’t destroy key seedlings you are relying on. Be aware of your feet and don’t walk around unnecessarily. Your best tools are your eyes.
When the time comes for weeding, watch that you don’t accidentally pull out or damage important native plants.
Ideally get in early when weeds are small and there’s still space between plants. It’s easier to remove the weeds without disturbing nearby natives.
If weeds have grown too big to pull out easily, you might need to use to techniques that cause less soil disturbance (such as cutting and painting with herbicide).
Spraying can a valuable minimal disturbance tool. Good strategy and technique will help you avoid damage to native plants.
But often some collateral damage is unavoidable, even acceptable. So don’t be so cautious that you are ineffective. Seedlings of some species (such as wattles in some situations) can be plentiful – even overabundant - and you can afford to lose a few.
But take care with species, or with parts of the site, that have very few seedlings. Where natives are scarce, you’ll need all of them.
We need to balance any damage caused by controlling weeds with the long term benefits we are expecting.

Thanks to the many people who have assisted in the development and production of this video.
Particular thanks to the sponsor of this series, South East Local Land Services.