Author Description

Popes Glen Creek, Blackheath New South Wales, Australia: Over 16 years (2002 - 2018), the Popes Glen Bushcare Group of volunteers worked with the support of Blue Mountains City Council and funding from the Government of NSW to rehabilitate a weed-infested and highly degraded silt flat at the headwaters of Popes Glen Creek. Creating a thriving Upper Blue Mountains Swamp from this former wasteland required: 1. removing a 1 ha. forest of mature willows (Salix fragilis) and the dense understorey of associated weeds 2. revegetating the area with approximately 10,000 wetland and riparian species of local provenance 3. controlling damaging stormwater surges in the creek and dispersing flow across the whole of the wetland 4. reducing accumulation of silt. This illustrated history of the ambitious and complex volunteer-led project contains: 1. 165 pages with 120 full-colour images 2. detailed description of each aspect of the project, including failures as well as successes, emphasising lessons learned and the central roles played by adaptive management and careful documentation of the project 3. 15 appendices providing details and scientific data of comprehensive monitoring of the evolution of the site (successful and unsuccessful plant species used; native and weed vegetation cover; quality of surface and subsurface water; soil accumulation rate; abundance and diversity of birds, frogs, stygofauna and macroinvertebrates). The intended readership includes bushcare volunteers and professionals, local councils and environmental groups, including schools interested in Citizen Science. It is both a motivational and "how-to" guide for groups tackling a large and complex rehabilitation project that perhaps seems over-ambitious.