Our latest project
The new toilet block was very welcome and we are pleased with how it turned out.
It’s now been landscaped and this week we mulched and planted the garden beds.
Many thanks to the volunteers who did the work – it’s looking splendid!
Fungi Foray at Westgate Park 24 May – registration
Call 0407 691 512 for more information.
Fungi on show
After good rain and cool weather, the fungal sporing bodies – the ‘mushrooms’ – are popping up throughout Westgate Park. As we can’t run fungi forays right now, we will bring you regular updates on what’s appearing in the Park.
Starting with the gilled species, Agrocybe praecox occurs worldwide and is right now the most prevalent in the Park. You can see it in groups right near the main carpark growing on woody mulch. It’s yellow cap generally splits soon after it emerges.
Chlorophyllum brunneum is a handsome mushroom. We strongly discourage eating any fungi from the Park and this species can cause serious illness. It is doing a good job however in breaking down organic material into useful nutrients.
We have been able to identify about 70 species of fungi in the Park but there are some that we can’t be sure of without examination under a microscope.
Others are easily distinguished like Bolbitius titubans but this small mushroom, typically found on grass, changes dramatically from a rounded, bright yellow, sticky cap to a silvery flat one and disappears within days. Unlike most inkcaps that liquify into black fluid, Parasola plicatilis spreads its spores and disappears within 24 hours.
Agrocybe praecox – Spring Agrocybe 
Chlorophyllum brunneum – Shaggy Parasol 
Chlorophyllum brunneum – Shaggy Parasol 
Agaricus sp. 
Coprinellus sp. 
Gymnopus sp. 
Gymnopus sp. 
Bolbitius titubans – Egg-yolk fieldcap 
Bolbitius titubans – Egg-yolk Fieldcap 
Parasola conopilus 
Paarasola plicatilis – Pleated Inkcap
Fungi have evolved with varied means of spreading their spores. Gilled fungi largely rely on wind which is why their caps and gills are lifted up on stems. Aseroe rubra is particularly bizarre. It emerges in an egg-like sac and has up to 8 ‘arms’ and is covered by a sticky, smelly, brown, spore-bearing mass that is walked off or passed through insects that are greatly attracted to it!
Geastrum triplex is as inventive. It is a tiny, double-layered sphere and the outer layer splits to stabilise and expose the papery puffball inside. The small hole at the top allows puffs of spores to shoot out as rain drops on the surface of the ball.
Mycenastrum corium is much larger – ~200mm across – and has a tough outer layer that splits on maturity and the spores are spread by wind and rain. Pycnoporus coccineus is a tough, bright red bracket fungus appearing on dead logs fir much of the year. It has fine, bright red pores on the underside, from which white spores are dispersed.
Aseroe rubra – Starfish or Anenome Stinkhorn Geastrum triplex – Earth Star 
Geastrum triplex – Earth Star 
Mycenastrum corium – hard-skinned puffball 
Mycenastrum corium – hard-skinned puffball 
Pycnoporus coccineus – Red Bracket
Covid-19 policy
We have implemented a policy of containment for the virus to keep our staff and volunteers safe.
If you intend to come to Bili Nursery or Westgate Park for volunteering, please ring Nic beforehand on 0401 790 423 and be sure to read our policy carefully.
Thank you!
Bird survey 2 March
Thanks to better-than-average summer rainfall, the large Freshwater and Saltwater Lake levels are high, as before, bringing small numbers of diving feeders such as Little Pied and Little Black Cormorants, Hardheads, Australasian Grebes and Hoary-headed Grebes, the latter present in higher numbers.
Teal are slightly more common now, while other water birds remain singly or in very low numbers. Unusually, we saw no Silver Gulls anywhere in the park – with just 28 along the Yarra River.
The lower than usual numbers (or none at all – Little Wattlebird) of the four honeyeater species seen year-round in Westgate Park are most likely due to the lack of flowering trees and shrubs during late summer.
Interesting/notable sightings:
• A single Rufous Fantail near the Friends’ compound. These seasonal visitors are occasionally observed from March – early April.
• Three Pink-eared Ducks filter-feeding in a tight circle on Large Freshwater Lake.
• An unidentified shore bird was briefly seen by some survey members flying rapidly from the southern edge of Large Freshwater Lake. It was possibly a Latham’s Snipe; Lucas Brook reported one on 9 February (eBird)
New bird species list out
The total number of bird species recorded in the Park is now 162 and in 2019, 88 bird species were observed – more than half!
Flowering now – the sedges
Lepidospermum concavum – Sandhill Sword-sedge (top) is a handsome sedge with sharp-edged leaves often tipped with reddish-brown. Its flowers are small whitish, emerging from brown spikelets.
Eleocharis acuta – Common Spike-sedge is a semi-aquatic sedge which spreads rapidly in shallow water with creeping rhizomes – here in the Chain of Ponds where they are providing safe habitat for water birds and frogs.
Pink Lake story
See the DELWP Biodiversity webpage under ‘Protecting the Pink Lake’ for the story of conservation and crowd control at the lake last year with quotes by our David Sparks.
With the hot dry start to summer the salt lake turned pink again in early January but we still don’t have boardwalks in place so please take care to not trample the saltmarsh vegetation around the lake edge.
Here’s the text:
Protecting Melbourne’s Insta-famous pink lake: Volunteers mix conservation with crowd control
When Westgate Park’s lake turned hot pink this February, it quickly trended as Australia’s hottest Instagram destination.
But behind the tens of thousands of social media selfies, a small team of dedicated environmental volunteers quietly toiled to protect this incredible wetland on the city’s doorstep.
Around 20 volunteers with the Westgate Biodiversity Bili Nursery and Landcare group suddenly found themselves in scenes more reminiscent of a daily, never-ending music festival, than a quiet inner-suburban park.
Together they clocked around 1500 volunteering hours in March, alternating conservation with crowd control.
Westgate Biodiversity’s manager David Sparks said the task was far greater than their three paid staff could manage.
‘Some days it was 1500 people, 1500 the next, it kept coming and rising,’ David said.
‘We have a great group of volunteers who work with us year-round on conservation and re-vegetation across 40 hectares, and suddenly it was all hands on deck doing all manner of tasks.’
Volunteers began producing signs for visitors, explaining what they knew about why the lake was turning pink (high heat, low rainfall is the start of the process), and collecting rubbish in every spare moment.
They worked to keep people from standing in the lake and tried to protect native vegetation against the crowds. Unfortunately and despite their best efforts, much of the recently planted saltbush was trampled and destroyed.
And while the impact on vegetation was upsetting for David and his group, the pink lake’s popularity has provided huge opportunities for the park to educate visitors more broadly about nature and conservation in the future, he said.
‘We’ve got 150 species of birds here and amazing plants we’d love for people to experience while they’re here,’ David said.
‘And because it’s likely that the lake will turn pink again next year, we’re now sitting down with Parks Victoria to look at a way forward. This includes possibly building a boardwalk to protect the vegetation, improving signage about the lake and its colour process and creating other designated visitor facilities and areas.’