a garden is also a habitat

Cheryl from the blog Conscious Gardening recently asked about the birdhouse in my garden. Thanks for asking Cheryl. Here is my reply …

I have three nesting boxes: one designed for possums, one for owls and one for parrots. I got the nesting boxes from a very special place: Latrobe Wildlife Sanctuary.

The Latrobe Wildlife Sanctuary is a habitat restoration project that has been managed by Latrobe University in Melbourne’s north for 35 years. It was created from an old farm paddock. Now there are nearly 30 hectares of River Red Gum woodland. It supports kangaroos, possums, bats, marsupial mice and a range of bird species.

It has a wonderful plant nursery that sells plants indigenous to the local area. The nursery sells nesting boxes that have been designed to meet the specific needs of bats, birds and possums.

The project helps community groups to establish habitat gardens that attract wildlife by providing shelter and suitable plants. It also provides educational tours of the sanctuary and provides informative teaching materials about local plants and wildlife.

The Latrobe Wildlife Sanctuary project has given me and many others a sense of hope and optimism for the future, and the knowledge and skills needed for environmental healing.







Back to my garden: there was a possum living in the possum box, but recently after a very stormy windy night I noticed that the lid was up. I climbed up the tree and closed it, noticing the possum was curled up inside. The next time the lid was up I climbed up again and this time the box was empty. There are possums that still visit the garden at night. I know this because they leave their droppings and leftovers from compost snacks. I suppose they are from other gardens. They are welcome but I feel sad thinking that the possum that called my nesting box home may have come to a sticky end.

I bought and installed the owl nesting box after I saw an owl one night sitting silently on a branch. Since then I have not seen it, but I hope one day either that owl or another will take up the offer of a comfortable home with its own observation platform.

This year there have been lots of noisy colourful rainbow lorikeets on one of the flowering eucalypts. I attached the parrot nesting box as high as possible to the trunk of this tree. It was boarded up in order to prevent aggressive feral birds like Indian myenahs from moving in. These birds compete with native species for food and shelter. The logic of the boards is that only parrots are able to peck their way through. Nothing happened for about a year. Then a few weeks ago I noticed that the hole was open. Have the lorikeets found their way inside? I hope ...