The "unsettling" historical legacies behind six of the most iconic peaks in central Victoria are laid bare in a new book by Great Dividing Trail Association (GDTA) founder and Honorary Professor, Barry Golding. Launching the book Six Peaks Speak  in Castlemaine in December 2024, the former Mayor of Hepburn Shire, Brian Hood remarked that  “the book was not only massive size, but massive in importance.”
 
In the early stages of research for the book, Gib Wettenhall climbed some of the peaks with Barry. The latter then went on to obtain a State Library of Victoria fellowship and spend a year digging through the archives to find the stories behind each of the peaks, many of them disturbing tales of dispossession and environmental degradation.

 Rodney Carter, CEO of DJAARA, the corporation for TOs of the Dja Dja Wurrung  was full of praise. He said the book is “helping us reframe a pretty traumatic period of our history. It offers a means of letting go of our misconceptions, and to help our children move forward... It gives my homeland a chance to heal.”  

Barry responded that “today is about giving back, especially to Djaara.” He commented that the State Library  saw the book as “a great aid towards navigating our way to Treaty in Victoria” (due for conclusion in early 2026 prior to the next state election).  

Barry acknowledged that “while the conclusions are mine” his good friend and co-author Clive Willman was an excellent sounding board and “very good at weeding out the rubbish” in his early drafts.  

​Barry ended his speech saying that after the defeat of the Voice, “what has happened is still unsettled.” What we need to do is “Listen,” which is the last word in the book – a comment that was given to him by a fellow Professor, Tony Dreise, Pro Vice Chancellor, Indigenous Engagement at Charles Sturt University. 

Six Peaks Speak has been published by Common Ground in the US as an e-book and limited hard copy numbers are available for $84 plus postage from Barry Golding if you contact him via email: [email protected]

Living With Wildlife is a book dedicated to navigating the challenges of how we share our homes and backyards with native wildlife. Written by a local ecologist and prolific science writer, Tanya Loos, this is her second book and is published by CSIRO Publishing.  The first that she wrote over ten years ago was a nature journal following the true Australian seasonal cycle in central Victoria of six seasons.  A lyrical little effort, Daylesford Nature Diary was published by em PRESS and edited by Gib Wettenhall. It sold particularly well around Xmas, which probably reflects poorly on the title and how literally some people take them.

This manual is a much more professional affair, complete with footnotes  backing up Tanya's tips on stopping birds flying into windows (try a sheen of clayey mud) or wrens attacking car side mirrors (put a sock over it). Invariably, she sides with the animal, urging as little intervention as possible. I fully agree that we humans already take up far too much space, and that showing appreciation and kindness for all our fellow inhabitants of Earth from spiders to flying foxes is well overdue. 

The University of the South Pacific (USP) and the Australian Centre for International Agriculture Research (ACIAR) jointly launched Raising Trees & Livelihoods in Fiji last September. Co-edited by Professor Digby Race, the Dean of the Graduate School at USP, and Gib Wettenhall from em PRESS, the book aims to bridge the gap between traditional forestry and agriculture practices by showcasing the benefits of integrating trees into farming systems. It draws on South Pacific, Asia, Africa, and Latin America case studies.

The book offers a comprehensive insight into the community-scale and national-scale potential of agroforestry, within the tropical regions of the world. Supported by ACIAR, the book draws on a decade’s worth of findings from more than 15 ACIAR-supported projects in tropical countries around the world. It provides a holistic analysis of how agroforestry can address challenges faced by smallholders who, according to statistics, manage less than two hectares of land, yet produce about one-third of the world’s food in the face of climate change, land degradation, and market volatility.

This is the second book Gib has co-edited with Digby.  The first reviewed the results of joint Australian and Indonesian agroforestry research with smallholders in Indonesia – visit Adding Value to the Farmers' Trees in Reviews.
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For more information and to order a copy,  visit the University of the South Pacific Book Centre or contact Professor Digby Race on [email protected]

This updated and expanded Second Edition builds on 15 years of hard-won experience in rethinking revegetation strategies to match ten key design principles, as observed in nature by the author and ecologist, Stephen Murphy. The Second Edition includes three new chapters, along with revisions based on further observation of nature in action since 2009. In a new chapter highlighting personal case studies, many landholders attest to having applied Stephens’ design principles and the results are now in – wildlife, in all its wonderful diversity, is returning.

​We have all read about the relentless decline of Australia’s plants and animals and the need to repair the natural habitats we have lost. Stephen’s binary response to this challenging dilemma involves planting wider ‘biorich’ plantations that mimic nature, while integrating ‘useful’ plants for human harvest. Incorporating 20% of plants in revegetation for personal use makes significantly wider biodiversity plantations attractive to landowners and provides a lifeline for Australia’s flora & fauna. Stephen writes a regular blog on the environment, which is posted on his website www.recreatingthecountry.com.au

‘Writing with passion, commitment and insight, Murphy emphasises the need to mimic nature and that working with nature requires a long-term perspective. It’s an important reminder that the actions we take today will shape the country that future generations will inherit.’
- Andrew Bennett, Adjunct Professor in Ecology, La Trobe University

The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape project received a total of four major awards at Interpretation Australia's annual conference and National Awards for Excellence event last Thursday 9 November in Sydney.  

​The awards included the top overarching grand prize. They were in the categories of:
• First Nations Interpretation Project
• Interpretation Planning and Design
• Interpretation Project – Outdoors over $75k
• Interpretation Australia 2023 Medal – the grand prize across all categories.
 
Check the Interpretation Australia website for the full details of the awards and the judges comments.
 https://interpretationaustralia.asn.au/congratulations-to-our-2023-national-awards-for-excellence/
 
Director, David Huxtable, of LookEar, the interpretive signage company that led the project, said: "This is a really pleasing result and a credit to all who have been involved in the project, and in what was a very detailed submission."

​Em PRESS Publishing principal, Gib Wettenhall, researched and  wrote the bulk of the content for the signage.

Signage and infrastructure at five locations are in place from the Budj Bim National Park & its crater lake, Lake Surprise, to the nearby Tae Rak Aquaculture Centre, which has a walkway out into the lake, a bush food cafe and a tank with live eels. Both these places are free and open to public access. Two other Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) locations, Kurtonitj and Tyrendarra, are only accessible as part of a tour. The south end has a publicly accessible entry station with info panels and BBQs at Tyrendarra township.

Features of the design are the use of rusty steel walkways, charred wood railings and stone walls, aiming to fit in with the landscape. Signs are kept low so as not to impede views.

Two Gunditmara companies are running guided tours. The main one, Budj Bim Cultural Landscape Tours, visits all sites but the Tyrendarra IPA  circuit:– go to Budj Bim Cultural Landscape - Visit Today 
The other company, Budj Bim Tours, has rights to visit Tyrendarra IPA:- go to Heywood | Budj Bim Tours | Windamara

Photos by the author and as supplied by Dave Huxtable, Director, LookEar, heritage interpretation designs, the company responsible for this project. I wrote the bulk of the interpretive signage content.

In 2019, the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape was inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage list – the first Indigenous-led nomination from Australia. Out now, the Second Edition of The People of Budj Bim takes up the story since 2010.
The new edition describes the painstaking nomination process over a 17 year period, culminating in the inscribing ceremony for the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape at the 43rd World Heritage Congress session in Baku, Azerbaijan.
Another added chapter looks at how the Gunditjmara have ably stepped up in healing Country, culture and the people themselves.
It was great to work once again with designer Max Marks; and I'd like to acknowledge the calm and consistent guidance offered by Denis Rose at the Gunditjmara end.
Published by em PRESS in late June 2022.

Woodsman Lachie Park has moved on to build a tiny one room hut out of green wood from locally sourced timbers and materials. It's in a clearing in the 15ha biorich plantation Lal Lal, SW Victoria, managed by Ballarat Region Treegrowers (BRT). Lachie's updated the traditional Aussie invention of the drop slab hut, so it not only celebrates localism, but is another beautiful example of pegging timbers the old, slow way.
In the process of going local and going slow, he reduced carbon emissions. Where combined with avoiding processed products, going local and slow leads to going carbon low. There's a slogan in there.

​Visit BRT's biorich plantation website for an essay on the rationale behind building the drop slab hut – see also the earlier essay on this website called Raising A Green Wood Shed.

Published by em PRESS, each of the 20 walks and 10 bike rides in the Central Victorian Highlands Walk and Ride Circuits guide is supported by full colour, large scale contour maps alongside detailed accompanying track notes. It’s sturdy, wiro bound and well-designed – features that replicate the style of the award-winning Goldfields Track guide. Graded from easy to hard, the circuits are scattered around all points of the compass within a 25km radius from Daylesford.
 
A team of five Great Dividing Trail Association (GDTA) members with vast collective experience specifically devised the walk and ride circuits, all of which are short enough to complete in around four hours. And because all of the routes presented are circuits, there’s no fiddling around with car shuttles.

Visit the GDTA's online SHOP to purchase for $24.99