Hatched...

Skarlette Violet, born on December 28, is the beautiful new daughter of Josiah Whitfield and partner Kristi, and first grandchild for Fiona McAuley.

Matched...

Congratulations to Ruth and Justin from the Wonky Donkey who renewed vows at Lake Elizabeth on February 23.

Dispatched...

John and Maureen were farewelled at an afternoon tea on February 15.

Plans for a rail trail from Birregurra to Forrest via Deans Marsh received a boost last month with the announcement of a grant to fund a feasibility study. Regional Development Victoria has contributed $45,000 to add to the $5,000 from the Colac Otway Shire and the $10,000 raised by Friends of the Tiger Rail Trail.

Ian Court of the Birregurra Community Group said that the project will complement Forrest’s renowned mountain bike trail network.

‘It will appeal to the families of mountain bike riders, plus attract a different demographic,’ he said. ‘We think it would be a major development for the communities and link the towns of the area.’

The funding will be used to engage an experienced consultant to work with land owners to identify the best route and to assess the engineering and construction costs associated with paving, bridges and cuttings.

‘Rail Trails Australia were really excited about the potential and believe the Tiger Rail Trail can be one of the best trails in the Australian cycle network,’ said Ian.

Research by Latrobe University’s Tourism and Hospitality Research Unit has demonstrated strong economic and social benefits from the establishment of rail trails. Findings indicate that cyclists spend more time in an area than other tourists and have a significant total spend in the local economy.

The existing section of the Tiger Trail in Forrest is used extensively by walkers, cyclists and horse riders. The trail heads 6 km towards Barwon Downs, while the and the whole length of the trail is 42 km.

The study will be completed in draft form by August and will go on display for 5 to 6 weeks for community comment. Ian said he hopes the trail will receive bipartisan support prior to this year’s state election.

On the trail of the Tiger

MARCH 2014

Lions chip in The Forrest and District Lions Club have pledged $5,000 to help fund the accessible toilet project at the Forrest Hall.

Lions funds are raised through volunteer efforts, including BBQs, the Soup Fest and chopping wood.

is overjoyed to receive the pledge.

‘We are all aware of how many BBQs and fund-raisers the Lions have run to raise this money, so we are honoured that they chose to give to us,’ added Susan.

‘This was a unanimous decision of all club members,’ said Nellie Shalley, Club President.

The total raised is now $31,000, leaving around $25,000 outstanding.

Susan Langridge said the Forrest Hall Committee

Bushfire Planning Policy Community Consultation

Saturday 15 March 2 pm – 3.30 pm

Forrest Public Hall

www.colacotway.vic.gov.au

Map courtesy of

Friends of the

Tiger Rail Trail

funny you couldn’t imagine inventing them!

Here’s a taste: Recalling her school days, a member at a recent event recalled the time when a boy brought a condom to school. He entertained the others by putting it over the drinking fountain and turning it on at full blast. It exploded showering everyone with water. There was some difficulty for the students to explain how they got wet but even greater pain for the teacher when she had to explain to the class what the article was for!

Send your tall story to kenw@pipline.com.

Ken Widdowson FDHS President

Tell your tall (but true) stories

We can gather lots of facts on Forrest people in the past like dates of birth and death, how big their family, where people worked, when their family arrived in Forrest, etc. But there is nothing that brings history alive like a good anecdote of life in the past. It is only when we hear a good story that we get a feel for what life was like in past days and what kind of people were our forebears.

Our Historical Society is offering a prize of $25 for the best yarn of a true event from the past.

It will be published in the Forrest Post and all stories submitted will go into our archives. There is no shortage of true stories. Some are so

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‘Making my first snowman ever’

My first month in Finland has been everything I thought it would be: cold, snowing and amazing! I have loved every second of being in this country of lakes. I have not done anything too over the top yet, but I am waiting for my 4 day trip to St Petersburg in March.

The most exciting thing I have done would be starting school and seeing how teenage Finns dress, behave and spend their free time. I thought they would all be skiing or snowboarding after school and weekends but some kids have told me they haven't skied in about 4 years! I haven't mastered skiing or winter sports but if I lived here I would be skiing to school!

Another thing that amazed me is whenever you go outside and it's snowing or really cold and there are still people going for morning runs or walking the dogs of an afternoon.

I am loving it here and have safely survived my first month - besides putting my foot through a lake which I thought was fully frozen!

Jasmine Walsh is a local schoolgirl on a 12-month Rotary exchange.

FFiinnnniisshh lliinnee......

Off the straight and narrow Works have begun on the streetscaping project on the east side of Grant Street. The project is expected to take 4 weeks to complete.

The concrete snakes around and between trees, making it more attractive than an urban-style footpath.

‘The alignment of the footpath has been placed to ensure limited impact to nature strip planting,’ said Rob Small, CEO of the Colac Otway Shire.

The concrete used is a 3-star rated environmental material which is almost white in its natural form. The original plan was for the path to be a gunmetal grey colour, but the pigment has coloured it much lighter due to the white base.

The path snaking toward Henry Street

There are three stages to the project, with the path linking the town facilities to the Tiger Trail being the first.

An extension to a cross-over point in front of the hall grounds involves kerbing and narrowing the entry to the service road. The final stage involves paving the parking area in front of the Forrest General Store.

‘It is anticipated that the works will add to the safety of pedestrians and riders, particularly school children, by keeping them away from the road and identifying a common crossing point,’ said Mary Dracup, Secretary of the Forrest and District Community Group.

MUCH TO-DO ABOUT MARCH

We’ll be appearing at:

The Apollo Bay Music Festival, The Otway Harvest Trail,

Melbourne Food & Wine Festival Lunch & the Deans Marsh

Pioneer Festival.

We’ll be open all hours across the March long weekend:

Thursday 6th

Lunch & PIZZA for Dinner

Fri 7th

, Sat 8th

& Sun 9th

for Breakfast, Lunch & Dinner

Mon 10th

for Breakfast & Lunch

We kick off with our new Autumn menu from Thurs 13th

March. Here’s a sneak peek:

Drunken fat pig – Irish Red Ale soaked pork curtle – fennel –

apple chilli chutney – sweet potato hash

phone 5236 6170

website forrestbrewing.com.au email info@forrestbrewing.com.au

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who’s

who: D

r Jan Ratcli

ff and N

ick Rom

anowski

Q: How long have you been in Forrest, and what brought you here?

Jan: We decided to move to Forrest (Aroona Court) from Melbourne 30 years ago, when it became obvious that a suburban garden was far too small for all the plants and animals we wanted. While I taught psychology at Deakin University, Nick worked on building our house and gardens.

By the time our daughter Kitty was born we’d planted more than 300 fruit and nut trees, and a large vegetable garden. I left Deakin after our second daughter Tali came along, to take over those aspects of the property that Nick no longer had time to keep up with.

Q: Nick, can you tell us about your work here?

Nick: Dragonfly Aquatics was the first indigenous wetland plant nursery in Australia, and we have supplied wetland plants and advisory services all over Australia.

I’ve also written 13 books on various plant, animal and ecological subjects since we’ve moved here. The first few were done from an armchair in a corner of the shed we lived in then, rotating several car batteries as needed for the laptop because we had no mains power for 17 years.

My best-known books are to do with water, with CSIRO commissioning a series on various aspects of wetland ecology over the past few

years. There are several more on the go, including finishing photography for a wide-ranging natural history of the Great Ocean Road.

Q: And Jan, you’re a school teacher now?

Jan: Yes, I teach maths and science part-time at Lavers Hill. Both our daughters went to Forrest Primary from day one to year 6. Nick and I were always involved with the school community, and though we miss that time I enjoy working in another fairly small school not too far way.

Q: What has kept you here?

Jan: We’ve loved the Otways—both the sea and the land—since the first time we came down here together. And we have no plans to leave the world that we have built up here for as long as we can walk, swim and enjoy our world.

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: La

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inn

on

an

d L

uk

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an

FFeeaatthheerreedd llooccaallss –– TThhee BBrreewweerryy ttuurrkkeeyyss

Q: What has brought you to Forrest?

Laura: We wanted to escape the city and get back to life in the country that we both had growing up, and have a go at being more self-sufficient.

I grew up on the Murray but my Mum’s family was from Apollo Bay. My grandma, Norma Fricke, started the first chemist shop where the Bay Leaf Café is now, so there’s always been that connection. Luke and I have loved holidays down here. I think we’ve camped, surfed, fished and bushwalked the whole coast!

The day we came to have a look at Forrest we had an amazing meal at the Brewery, found out about the bike tracks and all the things that were happening here – we thought it sounded like a pretty good place!

Q: What do you like most about being here?

Laura: It’s just such a beautiful spot to wake up in, and to watch the sunset at night. We’ve got our dogs and goats, chickens and ducks, it’s part of who we are now.

Luke: Probably the changes that we’re making on the block that we’ve bought. We’ve planted probably 500 trees, which I germinated from seed I gathered in the area. The farm was a blank canvas and our long-term goal is to regenerate the ecosystem, attract the birds and animals back here.

Q: Apart from your labours on your farm, what work do you do?

Laura: I work as a graphic designer, mainly publishing and software development.

Luke: I’m second chef at the Brewery. The clientele is good, and building continually. The Brewery is developing a lot and I’m going to be there for the foreseeable future.

Q: And what plans do you have for the future?

Laura: We’ve been here a couple of years now and we’re wanting to get involved in the community more. Find out who else is out there and what’s happening. I wish The Forrest Post had been around when we first moved here!

Luke: We’ll be kept busy for a while developing the property. In the long term, we’ve got a dream of buying a boat and sailing around the world, but we’ll start with a trailer sailer on the bay!

Owner: Matt Bradshaw

Names: The alpha male is Mr T, and the ladies are Mrs D and Balanda, which is an indigenous term for ‘white man’. The babies haven’t been named because that would be a bit awkward come Christmas.

Favourite pastime: They are bits of show-offs. For 4 or 5 months of the year they dance around flashing their tail feathers, especially Mr T as he tries to impress the ladies.

Best trick: They can bring out the inner turkey in humans. The birds like to gobble at the gate at passers-by. It’s amazing how many adults and children stand there and gobble back!

A notable misadventure: They are notorious for escaping. They turn up on the next door veranda with the German Shepherds and wander as far as Evans Earthmoving paddock.

One season they decided that the nest at home wasn’t good enough and wandered across the road to Brendan Murphy’s front yard to lay their eggs – at least we know why the turkey crossed the road!

Autumn usually brings the conditions suitable for Department of Primary Industries and Environment, Parks Victoria and the CFA to undertake prescribed burns. There is generally a small window to do these type of burns, as the fine fuel that carries the fire needs to have some moisture, but not so wet that fire is unable to persist, or too dry where it becomes hard to control.

There are two main reasons why controlled burns are necessary.

Firstly, the presence of fire in much of the Australian landscape over thousands of years has meant that many of the indigenous plants have evolved strategies to recover from fire and, in fact, many plants require

Autumn: tis the season for prescribed burns fire for their survival. The Mountain Ash, which can live for over 400 years, needs a hot fire at some stage to regenerate. Fire not only allows for regeneration of some plants, but it changes the environmental conditions, favouring some organisms and not others. It is likely that a variation of forest age is very important for the health of the ecosystem in general.

Secondly, prescribed fire is used to help reduce the impact and intensity of bushfires in summer. They reduce

WWhhaatt’’ss oonn iinn FFoorrrreesstt ......

Cycling Running Tennis Brew Crew social rides Every Thursday night at 6pm Departs from Forrest Brewery Pan y Agua in the Otways 145, 70 and 120km options, on road March 22 and 23 www.topbike.com.au

Giant Odyssey MTB marathon 100, 50, 15 km options - 27 April www.konaodyssey.com.au

Run Forrest Half Marathon 21 and 10km trail runs Sunday 8 June www.runforest.com

Semifinals Saturday March 8 A Grade: Kawarren Red v Forrest, played at Barwon Downs B Grade: Barwon Downs v Elliminyt, played at Birregurra Juniors Division 3: Elliminyt v Barwon Downs, played at Deans Marsh Division 4: Barwon Downs v Cororooke, played at Warncoort

Festival Fun Forrest Soup Festival June 8 Forrest Public Hall

the fuel load for a period of time, decreasing fire intensity and making fighting the fire more manageable. A controlled burn will also consume much of the bark on the trees, which reduces the number of embers. The majority of house loss during a bushfire is due to ember attack

As a community we need to learn to understand and prepare for fire and to live in balance with it, just as people of this area did centuries ago.

Peter Ashton Forrest Guesthouse

Planned burns in Forrest 2013/14 and 2014/15

Access the interactive map at www.depi.vic.gov.au, search for ‘Current Approved FOP’

The Forrest Post is an initiative of the Forrest and District Community Group. Every effort is made to remain current, accurate and non-partisan. Feedback, submissions and advertising input are encouraged. Submissions may be edited. You may request an electronic version by email delivery. Contact theforrestpost@gmail.com. Editors: Mandy Bishop, Mary Dracup

When you grow up with some of the best mountain bike trails on your doorstep, you can be spoiled for choice.

Twelve year-old Andrew Evans was recently asked to share his favourite trail in the online publication Terrain Mountain Bike Magazine. Guest writer, Adam Kelsall’s article included insights from locals.

Andrew’s favourite trails are Grass Trees and Marriners.

‘I love that you are able to undertake berms, logs, hill climbing jumps and drop off on Marriner’s Run. I love going with my Dad and riding these trails. At first he was always so far out in front of me and now I am able to get away from Dad now (sic),’ writes Andrew.

What is your favourite trail? Lily (11): ‘I like Number 1 (Forrest Loop) because it’s so pretty’

Zac (11) likes the downhill speed of the bottom part of Red Carpet (#3).

Kai (10) and Joe (7) both favour Marriner’s Run (#9) because of the ‘drop-off and the challenges’.

Claudia (9): ‘I like the steps and the little hills’ on Third Time Lucky (#5).

Henry (6): The first bit of 15 (Vista) and 4 (Roller Coaster), but he’s not fussy, he just loves riding!

Young guns Premiership hopes for Forrest tennis aces

Forrest Tennis Club is set to play finals once again in the local Polwarth and District Tennis Association’s A-grade competition.

It will be Forrest’s third finals appearance in the past four seasons and players are hoping that this year will break a 12-year drought since the club last tasted premiership success.

The Polwarth Tennis Association decided to run only one grade of senior tennis this year, due to lack of teams. This worked perfectly for Forrest as it allowed the club to play a mix of players with different abilities, rather than only top-level players.

'The group of players we have this year have been fantastic, I’ve really enjoyed meeting and learning to play tennis with the new members,’ club president Mark Murnane said.

‘The club had to rebuild this season after the loss of most players from last year’s side due to work

commitments, retirements, and so on. At the beginning of the season we actually didn’t enter a team as we didn’t think we had the numbers required to make up a side, let alone a competitive one.

‘We advertised in areas such as Winchelsea where there is no active Saturday afternoon competition, and were able to make up a team with players from Geelong, Moriac, Inverleigh, Winchelsea, Colac and Irrewillipe. Most of the players have had a connection with Forrest or someone associated with the club.

‘It’s a shame that more people from the town aren’t involved as we have a great tennis facility that is only two years old and is underutilised by locals,’ Mark said.

If you would like to support the Forrest tennis team in the A-grade finals, keep an eye on the Colac Herald for the finals draw.

Anne Murnane

Secretary Forrest Tennis Club

Congratulations to

The Corner Store for making

the shortlist for the top 10

cycling cafes in Australia in

Cyclist magazine’s “Coffee

Stop of the Year 2014”

Cast your vote at

facebook.com/cyclistmagazine

Late bloomers

Although this is not an area that is known for terrestrial native orchids, such as the Anglesea Heath or the Portland region are, it is surprising how many species can be found around Forrest.

Most of those species flower in the spring, when if you look carefully and patiently in the heath and forest around Forrest you will find them. There are however a small number that do flower in the summer and one of those you might just see flowering now is the Rosy Hyacinth-orchid Dipodium roseum.

This is a beautiful orchid that is common and widespread and produces a profusion of eye-catching rose pink flowers with tiny dark spots on the petals.

When you see this plant you will notice that although the Hyacinth-orchid has many flowers, it has no leaves. This is because it gets its nourishment through its intricate tuberous roots with the help of thread-like fungus called mycorrhiza. Because of the special relationship these plants have with this fungus, it is important that they should never be moved or disturbed, but should be left to form seed.

Watch out for the White Hyacinth-orchid Dipodium pardalinum. You’ll know it when you see it because the flowers will be white with reddish spots on the labellum (tongue). It could be in the Forrest area.

John Price

Season 2014 marks the beginning of the rebuild of the Forrest Netball Club.

The club has been kept alive in recent seasons by a hardworking group led by Belinda Rocka. This year Belinda has handed me the reins and, with a group of enthusiastic players and community support, I hope we can turn the club’s fortunes around.

I believe the key to rebuilding the club starts with providing players with a supportive, fun, community club environment where they can develop as individuals and as a team – on and off the court. Once we have built that positive club culture the on-court results will follow.

We're excited to have Ruth Mason coming on board in a development role with the senior teams. Ruth's knowledge of the game, from her representative experience with England Under-21 Schoolgirls team and time with Birregurra's A-Grade in 2012 is the positive

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Renee Seebeck looks forward to the

Lions 2014 season.

injection we need to start building a new club culture at Forrest.

The club's growth will also be boosted with The Wonky Donkey and Forrest Timber Products signing on as sponsors this year.

Forrest Netball Club is fighting back!

We're pleased to be close to filling all grades this year, but are still looking for a senior coach or coaches. Please phone me on 0409 101 190 if you would like to know more about netball in Forrest.

Renee Seebeck Forrest Netball Coordinator