South Sister St. Marys, Tasmania
There are numerous species of plants and trees on South Sister and during spring and summer the mountain is extremely colourful as many plants flower and fruit. There are banksias, hakeas, cheeseberrys, coreas, pimeleas, native pepper bushes and many other beautiful flowers to see. In addition there is threatened flora, Euphrasia collina ssp deflexifolia, recorded on the proposed coupe. The Eucalyptus brookeriana forest community is a threatened vegetation community protected under the RFA. Haloragis heterophylla (designated by Tasmanian Threatened Species Protection Act as rare) has been found 400 metres north of the coupe boundary in an adjacent coupe. An additional twelve threatened species have been found within 5000 metres of the coupe. A botanical survey was carried out on this coupe in December 2004 and found 86 species of flora. Since then a further 7 have been identified taking the total to 93. It is possible that there are many more species which have not yet been found but work continues to find more.
Eucalyptus brookeriana (protected under the Regional Forest Agreement) borders the eastern boundary of the coupe. This area is steep and Forestry Tasmania have proposed not to log this part of the coupe (under the RFA they are not able to anyway). However, as the road passes through the stand, some trees will have to be sacrificed to widen the road.
The rare Euphrasia collina ssp. deflexifolia is in abundance in clumps on the coupe. The myth that Euphrasia only grow in areas of disturbance is not supported by members of SOS who have found Euphrasia all over the coupe and have taken photos and GPS readings of the sites it is growing on.
Forestry plans to disturb a few areas where Euphrasia is found. The first corner will be 'straightened', effectively removing the rare species from this site.
Please see below the list of flora currently identified with photos for the majority of those identified.
Survey conducted by Todd Dudley
December 2004
Additional discoveries made on South Sister subsequent to survey:
50419-37031 (1, 8, 55, 556)
