Excursions
Mid-week Excursions
Wednesday 6th September
Mid-week excursions will be held all day on Wednesday 6th, September. Options will include
- Moonee Beach Nature Reserve
- Glenugie Peak
- Bongil Bongil National Park
- Dorrigo and New England National Parks
- Dieback, Forest Health and Forest Management
Pre-symposium Botanical Field Excursion – Tertiary volcanoes and Jurassic/Triassic Sedimentary Basins Field Trip
Lead: Mark Graham
The details of the pre-symposium excursion including costs are being finalised. The itinerary includes departing from Coffs Harbour on Sunday, 27th of August, and returning to Coffs Harbour on Saturday, 2nd of September, allowing travellers to attend the Sunday afternoon pre-conference get together. The current itinerary is preliminary and should follow closely to what is given here though some aspects may change before finalisation. The field trip will traverse a vast array of vegetation assemblages typical of the subtropical coastal regions of the upper north coast of New South Wales and the high-altitude eastern escarpment of the Great Dividing Range. The Gumbaynggirr traditional custodians will interact with travellers in some of the areas visited. Planned visited areas include Gondwanan rainforests, high elevation eucalypt forests and montane heaths in New England National Park; Old growth eucalypt forest and warm temperate rainforests in Cascade-Bindari National Park; the sandstone flora and highly diverse eucalypt forests of Sherwood Nature Reserve; the Clarence sandstone flora, coastal heaths and coastal floodplains of Yuraygir National Park, and the Gondwanan rainforests of the Border Ranges National Park.
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/new-england-national-park
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/cascade-national-park
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/bindarri-national-park
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/sherwood-nature-reserve
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/yuraygir-national-park
- https://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/border-ranges-national-park
Post-symposium Botanical Field Excursion – Mountains to Western Woodlands Field Trip
Leads: Greg Steenbeeke and John T. Hunter
The six-day field trip will depart from Opal Cove, Coffs Harbour, on Saturday, 9th of September, and return to Coffs Harbour on Thursday, 14th of September. This excursion will highlight the vast changes encountered crossing the high-altitude eastern escarpment of the New England Tablelands (>1,000 m a.s.l., mean rainfall >2,000 mm p.a.) down on to the western slopes and plains (ca. 200 m a.s.l., <600 mm p.a.).
North Coast Regional Botanic Garden – Coffs Harbour
Attendees are encouraged to make time during their stay to visit the North Coast Regional Botanic Garden, at your own cost / arrangements.
Coffs Harbour Botanic Gardens and Herbaria were opened officially in September of 1988. The gardens hold a pride of place within the heart of Coffs Harbour township. The garden contains extensive areas of native forests along with formal gardens and was created from what was originally an old waste dump. Picnic areas, ponds, rest and meeting rooms and a network of wheelchair friendly paths occur throughout. Coffs Creek surrounds three sides of the gardens which are fringed with mangrove swamps which grade into swamp forest, rainforest and sclerophyll forests. A variety of formal gardens occur including rare and endangered plants of the region and other parts of subtropical and tropical Australia as well as sensory, heathland, rose, North American, South American, Japan, China, India and South African gardens in addition to a glasshouse.
For more information please visit https://coffsbotanicgarden.com.au/