Natural History
The Natural History of Indooroopilly Golf Club
David Hassall and John Walthall
Introduction
Indooroopilly Golf Club has an exceptional array of flora and fauna on its 131 hectare complex at Long Pocket, almost unique given its location less than 10 km from the Brisbane CBD. Many of the trees predate the club’s move to Long Pocket in the 1960’s but lots have been planted since. IGC is also home, permanent or otherwise, to many bird species rarely seen in the urban environment.
The purpose of this project is to identify, locate and record as many species of plants, animals, fungi and other critters as possible and to make this information available for members via databases on the IGC website.
David Hassall, the project taxonomist, has identified and recorded more than 380 different plants and animals over the past two years and photographed many.
The main aim of the project is to introduce members and visitors to the richness and diversity of IGC’s flora and fauna. All Club members will be able to search the database and identify any plants or animals of interest to them.
Scientific or common names?
It’s appreciated that learning and using scientific names is not easy, but it does make sense to use scientific names (genus and species) arranged alphabetically in the main database. To help identification though, David has organised the database into groups based on growth habit, for the plants (e.g. flowering trees, shrubs, herbs etc.), and natural groupings (e.g. mammals, birds, reptiles, etc.) for the animals. Common names are included in the third column of this table. Problems may occur with common names where these change from place to place. The ‘rule’ followed here is to use those names that are believed to be MOST common in Southeast Queensland!
Where more detail is provided, such as the flowering calendar for the trees, the trees are listed in alphabetical order of common names, by which most people know them. Many of our golf buddies have stressed how important this will be! So golfers can identify flowering trees by the time of the year in the table and then with reference to the images that can be seen by clicking on the links in the column of common names.
Some images and a brief account of our very large ancient trees and their relationship to the original and/or older cultural vegetation of the site have been included, as this is of interest to many members.
It’s intended to gradually expand the tables of special groups, with notes and images, to further groups (possibly the 71 different birds, next) and will use common names alphabetically in these subsequent lists.
Work in Progress, with future updates
These documents comprise the results of only two years’ observations and are not yet a complete account of what may be observed in the future, across our site.
For example, some plants (about 10 species) have not yet been identified as yet, due to their not flowering or their flowers not yet being observed (by David!) Hopefully these will be included in the next update. Any assistance in identifying these would be appreciated.
Some fauna, such as waterbirds, only visit IGC occasionally and we are lucky if we witness their visits. Some only return every few years. For example, a pair of red-kneed Dotterels (waterbirds) was recently seen in the dam between Red 3 and Red 7. This was a one-off observation and they have not been seen since.
Some fauna (termed ‘cryptic’) are difficult to spot or are purely nocturnal and these have not been fully surveyed. A special effort will be needed to capture their presence.
The intention is to update the databases every six months or so and any observations by members, preferably with photos, would be most welcome, especially if you have an interest in particular groups. For example, Jack Wade has given us his list of observed butterflies.
So if you have any special or new observations, please let us know via the Club Administration or direct to our emails that are located in the member section.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the many golf buddies who encouraged and helped in this project. We are also grateful to President Mike Hume, his predecessor Sam Christie, CEO Steve Lamerton and the Board for facilitating this work to be published on the website. Thanks also to Lyndal Plant for reviewing the work and making several suggestions for improvements. We are indebted to Joan Wilkinson for proof-reading and sharing her considerable information on bird lists, photographs, recent plantings, identifications and nomenclatural changes. The technical assistance of Stuart Bouvier, the Club’s Operations Manager and website guru, is also appreciated for posting this material.
Copyright Statement
David Hassall (DH) and John Walthall (JW) invest the Copyright of data and all other associated material posted to the website in Indooroopilly Golf Club. Members are free to use portions of the material for private purposes, but should acknowledge the Copyright ownership of IGC. We don’t warrant the accuracy of any data or other material and readers who rely on these should undertake their own checking research. All digital images are by DH or JW, unless otherwise stated.