The Porters Road Grumpy® Power Trail
This is the third cache in the mostly arboreal power trail along the Porters Road Fire Trail. Most caches will typically require special equipment to access. Please take care. All containers are medium sized tubes.
Please let us know if any of the hides are inaccessible.
Porter Ridge Fire Trail to O'Hara's Creek
A large variety of local wildflowers, tall trees, valley and district views. This is a lovely walk along a sandstone ridge with significant sandstone ridgetop vegetation and down into a valley of tall trees. O’Hara’s Creek is named after James O’Hara, who is the first documented settler in the area. The creek rises near Round Corner in Dural and flows into Cattai Creek near Maraylya Bridge.
The walk starts at the end of Porter’s Road Kenthurst and proceeds along a level fire trail through stands of Bloodwoods (Corymbia eximia), Grey Gums (Eucalyptus punctata) and Casuarinas. This area was burnt by wildfires in 1992 and 2002. A little further on there is a track to the Pistol Club on the right. The vegetation opens out further along the track and depending on the season there will be Grevilleas, Banksias, Boronias, many species of pea flowers , Flannel Flowers and several species of Wattle flowering. There are also stands of Scaly Barks (Eucalyptus squamosa) which is a Eucalypt only found in Kenthurst on sandstone ridges. It is easily identified by its scaly bark and red stems.
More information can be found about the walk at: https://www.aussiebushwalking.com/nsw/sydney/the-hills/oharas-creek-walk-kenthust
Enjoy!
The Puzzle
In 2017/18, 33 million cubic metres of timber were logged from Australian forests. 87%, comprising 17.4 million cubic metres of softwood and 11.3 million cubic metres of hardwood, were logged from commercial plantations. 4.2 million cubic metres were logged from native forests.
Australia exported $3.6 billion worth of wood products, with strong international demand for raw materials such as logs and woodchips. $7.9 billion worth of timber products were imported, regulated under Australia’s illegal logging laws.
Of course, there are two sides to every story. In Australia, antilogging targets what supporters believe is inappropriate or unsustainable logging of native forests, although there have been allegations of illegal logging too. Globally, according to the Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment, illegal logging is a major problem. Driven mostly by profit, it negatively impacts forest ecosystems, communities and economies, and has been linked to civil wars and organised crime.