Weather holds out for weed beaters

A HARDY group of green thumbs braved the coldest day of the year recently to wage war on weeds.
Despite the cold snap bringing snowfalls to some areas, Deep Creek Landcare members were unperturbed by the weather.
They endured icy conditions to plant 200 trees on Pakenham roadsides.
Deep Creek Landcare president Meryl Waterhouse said the hardworking group, including the branch’s youngest member, twoyearold Joshua Rettschlag, whipped through the job in quick time.
“We got through the 200 plants in two hours,” Mrs Waterhouse said.
“We were lucky with the weather. At a quarter to eight in the morning I thought ‘this is going to be a disaster’ but we didn’t even get rained on,” she said.
“We were very fortunate.”
The Deep Creek Landcare group has used funding from Cardinia Shire Council’s tree program to remove blackberries, sweet pittosporum, flaxleaf broom and other weeds from roadsides and rural properties and replace them with native trees and shrubs.
Mrs Waterhouse said the Landcare group was encouraging residents to remove the noxious weeds from their properties and would work with landholders to restore native vegetation.