The Editor

The past 12 months have seen Forestry Corporation of NSW implement a $46 million bushfire recovery program to repair NSW State forests, the largest in the organisation’s history. The equity injection has seen Forestry Corporation repair priority damaged public infrastructure, expand its Blowering and Grafton nurseries, and start replanting bushfire-affected State forests.

Rockhampton Airport has today welcomed one of Alliance Airlines new commercial aircraft with a special water cannon salute to mark its arrival. The Embraer E190 is one of 30 newly acquired aircraft Alliance is adding to its regional fleet with an exciting proposal on the cards to build a hangar and maintenance facility at Rockhampton Airport to help service the airlines entire fleet of over 70 aircraft.

The Coastal Fox Control Program will be underway again this autumn in an effort to protect our native wildlife from the predatory fox in coastal bushland areas from Maroochy River to Peregian Springs.

In the hope to improve native vegetation within the municipality, Greater Shepparton City Council are inviting schools and community groups to take part in the ‘One Tree Per Child’ project, a global project that aims to plant one native indigenous plant for every child under 18 years old between 2017 and 2021.

Steve Dobbyns. The native forests of the north coast of NSW are not just the backdrop for an idyllic seaside lifestyle for its 1.7 million residents, they also sustain a hardwood timber industry that has been in existence for more than 150 years ... The 2019/20 Black Summer bushfires have emerged as a tipping point for the hardwood timber industry on the NSW north coast.

With power out throughout the Midwest and extensive damage to properties in the region, the City of Greater Geraldton is reminding people to be cautious of food safety and to be asbestos aware.

A University of South Australia research team is developing a prototype it hopes will one day be able to measure a whole vineyard microclimate in 3-D and in real-time. Professor Anthony Finn and his team are pioneering a technology known as AAT (acoustic atmospheric tomography), which observes the temperature and wind flow in the atmosphere above a vineyard and combines it with observations of the vineyard obtained using miniaturised long wave infrared cameras. This creates an accurate temperature mosaic of the vineyard infrastructure (vines, posts, inter-row ground, etc).

A more sustainable global fish economy could be created by using food scraps to make high-quality food for farmed fish, according to a team of researchers at The University of Western Australia.

Residents flocked to the streets to applaud Bert’s return after about eight year’s absence as the pioneer aviator served in the war and followed his dream to breach the limits of flight. “Shortly after 2.30 … the buzzing of an aeroplane engine and propeller could be heard,” the Bundaberg Mail reported. “Amidst cries of its “Hinkler’s Baby Avro,” people began to swarm into the street and gazed interestingly at the machine, which by this time was doing some sensational stunting over the town.