A workshop was organised recently in Roleystone to discuss the worrying trend with marri (Corymbia calophylla) in our area. Roleybushcare invited Professor Giles Hardy and his associate, Dr Trudy Papp to give a presentation to our community. Professor Hardy is the Director of the Centre of Excellence for Climate Change Woodland and Forest Health at the School of Biological Sciences and Biotechnology Murdoch University, Western Australia.

Before the workshop, Dr Ian Colquhoun (Chairperson of Roleybushcare) and Pat Hart (Chairperson of SERCUL) took our guests to see the marri trees along Croyden Road. At the workshop we were given a very informative outline of the disease and an explanation on how they were progressing. Many years of work are ahead for the researchers and some "Citizen Science" help will be requested at times. They are preparing an App for mobile phones. The broad community will be able to take a photo of a marri tree and then log some information into a prepared form directly on your mobile phone. This will automatically give the GPS of the tree and then it will be sent to be processed by Murdoch researchers. Watch this space because we will be promoting on our website.

Click here to view all the information that we can find about this worrying trend and also to view the powerpoint presentation given by Dr Papp and Dr Giles.