The Cape Bird Club

MINUTES OF THE CAPE BIRD CLUB CONSERVATION COMMITTEE

Minutes of the meeting held on Mon  2 December 2009 at Dave's house.

Present: Dave Whitelaw, Felicity Ellmore, Frank Wygold, Isabella Haydon, Cliff Dorse, Suretha Dorse, Doug Harebottle, Gavin Lawson.

Apologies: none

1. Strandfontein - Onno contacted Dave – Dave must apply again next year for funding. The boundaries of False Bay Ecology Park have been finalised. Capricorn and Pelican Park pans (which have important vegetation and an endemic butterfly) have been included. The application for money from TMF must be for Strandfontein as part of FBEP.

  • Asief has allocated two staff members to work with Victoria. They have cleared P2 of hyacinth.
  • Gavin is still waiting for reports from Victoria for the website.

2. Paarden Eiland – The sewage pipe next to the vlei is on the surface, not buried so will be easily damaged when work is done around the vlei. Need to pack stuff around it to bury it. Frank is trying to find out which direction the sewage is being pumped.

  • Frank does have a management plan – will discuss it with Koos and Bongani.
  • Hyacinth is back – about 10m2 Cliff will contact Ian.
  • Frank has heard nothing from PWD about being moved out.

3. Raapenberg – Captruat has been given a 3 year lease for the envirocentre from PWD.

  • BKS (doing M5 roadworks) have bulldozed a pedestrian pathway through Raapenberg. Maya has consulted with them – it is a temp path until something else has been done. She will keep Isabella informed. Suretha will contact Maya to help her with contacts.
  • Gill Ford is not able to take Isabella’s place on the committee. Dave suggested Simon Foggarty or Charles Saunders.
  • Oude Moulen have asked CapTrust to support them as there were two land claims for the area when Province transferred the land to National.

4. Edith Stephens - Asief is helping clear the hyacinth.

  • Stacy wants to introduce a Garden Bird activity next year
  • The intake outing is going to take place next year. 14 Dec 09 to 18 Dec 09 is going to be schools week at Edith Stephens. Stacy wanted Doug to ring on 15th but he will be away. She needs birders to help with ID on 17th.
  • Dave suggested that we have a meeting with Stacy to plan next year.

5. Flaminkvlei - Nothing to report. Suretha will find out more. If nothing is submitted for 6 months the whole thing falls away.

  • Gavin feels that the West Coast is out of our territory – we should be offering our help to local people, its not feasible for us to be involved. Birdlife should be there.
  • Keith Harrison is on the West Coast - Caroline Ah Shene represents Birdlife at Verlorenvlei

6. House Crow - the proposal for urgent registration is in. Dave has sent the supporting documents. Louis is sure it will be done by the end of the year. They are using the last bit of Starlicide to restart the program.

  • Guy Preston wants to go public with the whole issue.

7. Penguins - Lauren from Dyer Island sent Dave an email to say there have been developments but she will let Rob tell him. Dave hasn’t heard anything.

8. Phillippi Wetlands - Doug asked if the wetlands are under threat from the landowners. We need to make the landowners aware of the importance of the area.

  • 480ha are under pressure to be rezoned and developed.
  • Cliff will find out haw many land owners there are.
  • Felicity will contact Otto Schmidt next year as he has contact info for some of the landowners.

9. Princess Vlei development - Nothing new to report. ROD expired at the end of Nov. Will need another EIA and public participation before anything can happen.

NEXT MEETING - 18h00 on Monday 11 Jan 2010, at Rondevlei Nature Resreve.

                                                                                                                                            

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