WATERSHED VICTORIA

WINTER WHALE WATCH 2011 LAUNCH

KILCUNDA HALL
2pm, Sunday 29 May

It’s whale watching time again. Watershed Victoria is launching Winter Whale Watch 2011. At the launch you will be able to find out more about last year’s sightings, how to identify different whale species and where are the best whale viewing locations in South Gippsland.

You can phone/sms your sightings to the Whale Watch hotline: 0438 646 677

Please use this form to record your sighting

email completed form to the email address at the bottom of the form

Use this for to help identify Whales

Photograph by Geoff Glare

The shearwater, or muttonbird chicks are leaving!

Watershed volunteers are getting organised over the next few weeks (Easter onwards) to protect the young shearwater birds leaving the Bass Coast for their annual migration to the Arctic (read more in Bulletin No11 on the Watershed website).

Training for monitoring around the plant and between Wonthaggi and Kilcunda Saturday 23rd April 2011. Meet at the Lower Powlett carpark at 6.30pm. Bring warm cloths, torches and good humor. Further details ring 0413 902571.

To read Watershed’s media release  click here

You may have seen the large notice on pages 28-29 of this week’s Sentinel Times with information about the Phillip Island Nature Park Open Day on 27 March.

Many interesting activities have been organised. Of particular interest to Watershed members are the Shearwaters at Sunset event at 6.30pm and the two sessions about Little Penguins at Sea (11am and 4pm). The shearwaters will shortly be departing on their annual migration and the lights and structures of the desalination plant are particularly hazardous for young birds.

It should also be interesting to find out about where penguins are feeding in relation to the desal.

click here to view:-

community open day 2011 program and timetable

WATERSHED VICTORIA

‘We’re still here!’ Christmas picnic celebration

WHEN: Saturday 11 December from 5.30pm

WHERE: Mouth of the Powlett River.

WHAT TO BRING: Bring a picnic, musical instrument…

DRESS CODE: Colourful attire

“Turning Off The Tap”

It never rains, it only pours
When contractors get their money-grubbing paws
On the common wealth of this once-great state
Oh, will the wastage never abate?
Not as long as John Dubbya & Company
Continue to have the outrageous effrontery
To take our taxes and haemorrhage them to
The greedy, never-sated few.

They can spot his type a mile away:
The type happy to pay and pay and pay
And say: “Look here, we’re taking action!”
Till their governments’ finances end up in traction.
And reluctantly, to stop further harm
The poor old voters hand over the farm
To people who impose economic rationalism
With all the subtlety of fascism.

There’s only one way to stop the drip:
Take the captain and crew of this ship
Truss them up with a length of cord
And throw the whole lot overboard.

Watershed Victoria AGM

Date: Tuesday 9th November

Where:  Picassos on Graham, Wonthaggi,

Time:  7pm.

Pizza and pasta available if wishing to dine.

“Scrap the Desal”  Rally on the steps of Parliament

Midday on Wednesday 6th October

We have had a amazing few weeks with the Brumby Government under intense scrutiny over the financing of the desal fiasco.

This is a crucial time, coming up to the state election - Parliament is sitting and politicians are listening.
Join us and bring your outrage at the money we will be paying for the next 30 years to fund a wasteful energy guzzling project which even Labor insiders are now questioning.
Listen to speeches on canning the desal contract.

See Timmie the giant desal tap, all the way from Gippsland!

More info 0407 811 778 or answers@watershedvictoria.org.au

If you can’t come, you could contact your MP and the Premier john.brumby@parliament.vic.gov.au (03) 9651 5000 calling for scrapping the desal plant and replacing it with sustainable cheaper alternatives.

www.watershedvictoria.org.au

Last season 42 separate whales were sited within 10 kilometres of the desal site (stat decs and photos confirm this). The Government’s EES said there were virtually no whales in the area and it was not significant habitat (the EES said only a couple of whales had visited the area over the last five years).

To build on the data from last season we are launching “WHALE WATCH”, an initiative to get details of as many whales as possible visiting us this season. We will then have good data to see how construction and later operation of the desal plant is effecting these beautiful creatures.

Please click on the image above to get a printable version and distribute wherever you can. Phone in any sightings, even any unusual events that you observe on our coast, we should be able to get photographers and observers down asap.

Further details as to where to drop off forms if you see something and fill one in will follow shortly

Form to record Whale sighting.          Download

Document to help you recognise and identify whale species.          Download

It has been about nine months now since the consortium building the desalination plant last met with the community to give any details of what they plan to build.

This is a very unsatisfactory situation. The government have set up a community liason committee that gives the community the same spin answers as the DSE used to. After requesting the answers to many questions over the last months without getting answers we called for another community forum. In the end we have had to set one up ourselves. Senior staff of the consortium have been asked to attend and sit on a panel, as have staff of the Bass Coast Shire. We also have a panel of water, environmental and economic experts to help answer the community’s questions about the desal plant being built and its likely effects.

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FREE ADMISSION:  Saturday 22nd May

Wonthaggi Town Hall, 7.30 pm.

Please click on the poster and print off copies to distribute to those you think might be interested