Alpine Garden Society Victorian Group

Australian Alpine Education and Research Grant Program 

A program funded by The Alpine Garden Society Victorian Group

 

This year the AGSVG has taken the first step in supporting alpine education and research utilising the Gordon’s bequest, with the inaugural round of funding through the Australian Alpine Education and Research Grant Program.

 

Small grants of up to $5000 were available to individuals or organisations in this initial round, for projects of up to 12 months duration. Applicants provided detailed submissions which were carefully considered by the committee, resulting in the awarding of six grants.

 

As part of the funding agreement, grant recipients will provide the committee with an interim report to outline their progress, and a final report, and will be required to present their research to the AGSVG at a meeting and/or provide an article for the journal. There may also be opportunities for ongoing engagement and collaboration with the people running these projects.

 

The successful applicants include two researchers from the Royal Botanic Gardens Victoria, two PhD candidates from the Australian National University, and two ecologists, one from the Mt Hotham Alpine Resort Management Board and the other from the Falls Creek Resort Management. As would be expected, some of the projects are concerned with the impact of climate change and other environmental stressors on alpine plant communities. Several also include a component of ‘citizen science’ to assist with data collection and as a means to engage with the broader community.

 

Dr Megan Hirst and Russell Larke (RBGV).  Megan who will be known to many AGSVG members, and Russell, who head Horticulture at the Cranbourne gardens, have proposed a project titled “Raising Rarity: The Alpine Collection”. This project seeks to engage the public with the plight of threatened and endangered alpine species by growing and displaying these species in accessible research plots at the RBGV Cranbourne, and is an extension to the successful “Raising Rarity” pilot program, which was funded through other charitable and philanthropic sources. This project will establish reliable propagation protocols for a number of endangered alpine plants, and assess their suitability for use in ornamental horticulture. In the pilot program several plants were identified that require further assessment - Podolepsis laciniata, Brachyscome tadgellii, Leucochrysum albicans subsp. tricolor, Argyrotegium nitidulum and Lobelia gelida. Additional species to be studied include Phebalium squamulosum subsp. alpinum, Celmisia constiniana, Craspedia aurantia var. jamesii and Olearia brevipedunuculata. Megan is very keen for AGSVG members to visit the project once it is up and running at Cranbourne, hopefully in early 2023.

 

Dr Rebecca Miller (RBGV) will be researching methods for the seed propagation of the rare Snowy Beard-Heath, Acrothamnus montanus. A. montanus is confined to high-alpine areas on or near the Bogong High Plains and in Kosciuszko National Park. Attempts to germinate seeds of A. montanus, and other alpine members of the Ericaceae family, by conservation seedbanks, have been mostly unsuccessful as the seeds display complex dormancy. Developing germination protocols for A. montanus will inform propagation methods for other ericaceous alpine species.

The Snowy Beard-Heath is also an important part of the diet of the critically endangered Guthega Skink, as it relies almost entirely on the fruit of this species through its summer breeding season. Determining germination protocols for A. montanus is also critical for conservation of the Guthega skink in providing a food source in a captive breeding program and in ensuring a food source for reintroduced skinks.

 

PhD candidate, Jessica Ward-Jones (ANU), will be studying climate-change related snow-gum dieback in the Australian Alps. Snow gums are the only tree species growing above 1600m, and their loss would have an impact not only on rainfall patterns in the Alps, but river flows downstream, as well as the impact on the alpine ecosystem. In her PhD, Jessica will be developing a validated approach for mapping of snow gum dieback, in order to identify opportunities to slow spread, and assist efforts aimed at protecting healthy trees and restoring affected stands. Mapping the whole Australian Alps bioregion will require the use of remote sensing and modelling predictions, but in order to validate those methods Jessica will need to conduct on the ground surveys. To assist in these surveys, Jessica will be using part of her funding to take undergraduate students and community members into the field to help with data collection. The funding will also be used to develop an app-based survey and accompanying educational resources to distribute to ‘citizen scientists’ who wish to contribute to data collection. An online interface will be created to allow contributors to see where data has been collected, where their data fits in, and where gaps in data exist. This is a project that AGSVG members could be able to engage with directly.

 

Another PhD candidate from ANU, Joshua Coates, will be studying Alpine pollination ecology in Kosciuszko National Park. Joshua will be addressing three questions in his research. Firstly, he will be looking at whether alpine flowers are using flower warming to attract pollinators (this has been observed in alpine regions in Europe) and whether the flower microclimate variations impact pollinator activity. This will be done using a thermal camera and thermocouples, which are electronic sensors which measure temperature. His funding will be used, in part, for the purchase of this equipment. Secondly, Joshua will be studying the plant-pollinator networks that exist in Kosciuszko, and whether these vary with altitude and across the flowering period.

Finally, Joshua will be looking at the role that Bogong moths play in the pollination network in Kosciuszko, and whether they fill a different niche to other pollinators. Bogong moths, when captured, have enormous amounts of pollen on them, and this can be used to identify the species visited.

 

The final two successful applicants are ecologists from Mt Hotham Alpine Resort and Falls Creek Resort Management.

 

The Mount Hotham Alpine Resort Management Board project, led by environmental officers Beverly Lawrence (more than 40 years experience working within the Alps) and Aviya Naccarella (who has a research background, having completed her honours research on the impact of variable fire regimes on snow gum survival and recruitment at alpine and sub-alpine treelines) will be using their grant funding to develop and publish a flora field guide depicting common indigenous species found within the Mount Hotham Resort. The booklet will fill a void in their public outreach and educational material, as there is no specific field guide for Mount Hotham Resort, particularly one accessible to those without a scientific or botanical background. The booklet will further provide a platform for community education and engagement on conservation matters, promoting the uniqueness of the alpine and sub-alpine landscapes, and encouraging the public to learn about and appreciate indigenous alpine flora, and as such feel a responsibility to protect it. The booklet will initially be available for the public digitally, accessed online via their website. The future aim is to print the booklet and make it available at the tourist information desk at the Resort Management Board offices at Hotham Heights and across local tourism information centres such as in Bright and Omeo.

 

Falls Creek Resort Management (project led by Naomi Monk, Environmental Officer), in  partnership with Mt Hotham Resort Management Board and La Trobe University, are delivering the Snowpatch Vegetation Monitoring Project. It will be an ongoing citizen science project aimed at encouraging and promoting community awareness of the importance of threatened Snowpatch communities. Snowpatch vegetation communities are a unique mix of high mountain plants and animals, many of which are threatened species, and are restricted to areas where snow persists into summer. Little is known about how the seasonal variation in snow cover affects the size and persistence of late-lying Snowpatches from year to year in Australia’s alpine regions, nor the impact that has on the vegetation communities that occur in these areas and how climate change may impact these communities. 

 

The monitoring project will collect long-term visual data with the aim of measuring changes to the size and persistence of snow cover of two individual Snowpatches within the alpine resorts of Falls Creek and Mount Hotham. Funding will be used to install two large information signs providing details of the Snowpatch vegetation communities at Falls Creek and Mt Hotham. These will include cradles suitable for smart phones and tablets so that members of the public can take photos of the Snowpatches and upload them to an online data storage system. Data analysis and research will be done in collaboration with La Trobe University, with the aim to understand Snowpatch vulnerability and devise methods to contribute to Snowpatch protection.

 

For our first foray into the world of operating as a granting body, we were impressed by the enthusiasm and calibre of all the applicants, and are looking forward to sharing the outcomes of these projects with AGSV members over the next 12 months.