Aussie woman's 'incredible' 500-year-old discovery after hidden behind invasive weed
An Aussie woman has made a remarkable centuries-old discovery after clearing away an invasive plant that had swamped her property. Close to 80 per cent of the retiree's NSW Northern Rivers farm was covered in dense lantana that shot up to 4.5 metres into the sky.
As Barbara Linley began slashing away the thickets, the native bushland beneath was revealed, and she was able to explore new gullies that were previously impenetrable. Most surprising of all was a towering eucalyptus with an 11-metre circumference that experts believe has been growing there for 500 years.
'It's an incredible tree,' she told Yahoo News. 'We've now found three others. It's just a joy because they're so old, and there's not many in the Northern Rivers, so we need to protect them.'
Lantana is one of Australia's worst invasive weeds, covering around five million hectares of coastal and hinterland. Because the plant is so thick, it deprives small native plants of light, killing everything beneath it.
Large trees are also severely impacted by its growth because it acts as a fuel ladder during bushfires, allowing flames to run up high into the canopy.
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Barbara has been able to pay for help to clear the weed thanks to funds from World Wide Fund for Nature-Australia (WWF-Australia), the NSW Department of Environment, the NSW Biodiversity Conservation Trust and Envite Environment. The scheme provides landholders with up to $45,000 for activities like clearing weeds to improve the habitat of the state's endangered koala populations.
Tanya Pritchard from WWF-Australia said the recovery of koalas across NSW will be dependent in part on private landholders protecting high-quality forest.
'More than 50 per cent of remaining habitat for koalas is on private land, so landholders such as Barbara are critical for koalas' long-term survival,' Tanya said.
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Around 20 conservation agreements have been signed as part of the project, and more than 900 hectares have been protected. Barbara has signed an agreement covering nearly 51 hectares of her 78-hectare Tullymorgan farm. She's also removed cattle from the property and planted over 1,000 trees to reconnect fragmented habitat.
The 78-year-old hopes to leave the farm in a better condition than when she bought it six years ago. Along with koalas, the property is also home to barking owls, powerful owls, goshawks, glossy black cockatoos, yellow-tailed black cockatoos, little bent-wing bats and rare frogs.
As the lantana has come down and Barbara has been able to access the trees, she's invited the non-profit Nature Conservation Council onto her property to put up 25 nest boxes for squirrel gliders and feathertail gliders.
She's also bought a second property further south at Taloumbi that's home to rare coastal emus. Fewer than 50 are thought to survive across the entire NSW north coast. They have declined and are now listed as endangered due to habitat destruction and fragmentation, road strikes and invasive species.
'I saw emus and thought that is a sign so I decided to buy it. I didn't know they were rare emus,' Barbara said.
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