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How can I get help for grasslands?

There are lots of resources available to help you do what you want to do.  Try the links below for more internet resources to help with science, legal aspects, growing your own grassland and managing grasslands.  But you may find what you really need is to talk to someone.  One of the easiest ways to meet people with interest, sometimes passionate interest, in grasslands is to join one of FoG's activities.  Non members are always welcome.  If you have a specific problem that you can't fix yourself Contact Us and we'll see what we can do to help.  We are nearly always interested in visiting grasslands we haven't seen before and can bring a range of expertise to your place if you think you might have something valuable and want to find out more about what you have got.  Let us know.

A good field guide, written for the NSW southern tablelands but useful elsewhere too, is Grasslands Flora.  It covers both Australian and introduced species.

Friends of Grasslands has three brochures:

• Conserving Whole Ecosystems
• Grasses: Habits and Habitats
• Weeding to Restore and Protect Your Patch

If you need help with the science of grasslands or identifying species, try these links.

• Grassland quality indicator species lists.  See also the Grasses: Habits and Habitats brochure.
• Grasses of New South Wales (DJB Wheeler, SWL Jacobs & RDB Whalley, University of New England) is designed to assist  identification of all grasses growing in the state.  It includes a section on the nomemclature of the parts of grass plants to help you understand scientific descriptions of grasses, as well as botanical keys, a description of each species, a glossary and bibliography.  The third edition (2002) is out of print, but a fourth edition is expected to be published in the first half of 2008.
• Grasses: Habits and Habitats
• Photos of many grassland species are available at http://thebegavalley.org.au/plants.html.
• The Australian Network for Plant Conservation runs more or less regular workshops on identifying grassland species.  See, for example, http://www.anbg.gov.au/anpc/canberra20071122.html.  It also has a listing of useful web resources.
• Information on reptiles is held by the Australian Herpetological Society.
• Google books and Google scholar can provide information you won't find in a standard web search.
• Australian libraries catalogue will find books and other materials held by major Australian libraries.
• Government agency websites can also provide scientific information.  Botanic gardens are major repositories of scientific knowledge.

If you need help with legal aspects, have a look at these.

• The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 provides legislative mechanisms to protect listed threatened ecological communities and species.
• In the ACT, the Nature Conservation Act 1980 lists threatened species and communities, and provides for management agreements.
• In NSW, the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974 provides for Voluntary Conservation Agreements which place legally binding covenants on land titles to protect plants, animals and aboriginal heritage. The Threatened Species Conservation Act 1993 lists threatened species and ecological communities.
• Other jurisdictions have similar legislative arrangements.  Australian legislation can be accessed through the Australasian Legal Information Institute.

If you want to grow your own.

• Association of Societies for Growing Australian Plants has information about all manner of Australian plants, including the grasses and forbs which grow in natural grasslands.  It has member organisations in each State and the ACT.
• Australian grasses and associated species are increasingly available from commercial and community plant nurseries.  Some produce in quantities suitable for landscape scale plantings.
• Greening Australia and the Australian Trust for Conservation Volunteers may be able to help with bigger projects.
• Contact Us re the FoG Cultivation and Conservation Group
• Couple of useful websites: http://www.understorey-network.org.au, a Tasmanian website with a database of species which includes details of cultivation; and http://www.anbg.gov.au/gnp/index.html - 'gnp' stands for growing native plants.

For help with grassland management.

• The Australian Network for Plant Conservation runs courses and workshops related to grassland management.

• There are several Conservation Management Networks (CMNs) which provide advice on grasslands. The Grassy Box Woodlands (GBW) CMN on the western slopes of NSW has shown that CMNs offer an effective long-term conservation mechanism for ecological communities that are difficult to conserve by other means. Established in 1998, the GBW CMN is still growing in membership numbers and support.  A CMN is a network of remnants and their owners or managers, and other interested individuals. They aim to provide support and stimulate partnerships between local communities, government, educational institutions, scientists and conservation practitioners to protect and manage important remnants. The CMN provides an overarching framework to coordinate protection of sites and implement adaptive management. An ecological focus allows a CMN to provide highly targeted advice and support.  Others in NSW include the Monaro Grasslands CMN, the Far South Coast CMN and the Southern Tablelands Grassy Ecosystem CMN, and others may emerge.  CMNs in Victoria include:

  • Northern Plains
  • Wedderburn
  • Broken-Boosey
  • Gippsland Plains
  • East Gippsland Rainforests.
• Burning is often an important part of grassland management in Australia.  In NSW, workshops are run by Hotspots.
• See the Weeding to Restore and Protect Your Patch brochure.