Who's Ring barked these Acacia Longifolia and Floribundas?

[WAGES]

I was out for a bushwalk today, basically a field trip by myself to learn how to identify Acacias.

I walked up a hill through some bushland I know of and came across a large amount of Acacia Longifolia and Acacia Floribunda. From what I've read they have a Low to Medium Tryptamine content.

Anyway to my question. Every other Acacia in the area was unharmed except for the A. Longifolia's and A. Floribunda's, they were all Ring barked down the bottom of the trees and look as though they've been sprayed with something coloured blue.

I have two theories on what's happened.

1. Someone has come and taken a small amount of bark from at least 20 of the trees for themselves.

2. The local council has decided to try and eradicate Tryptamine containing trees by Ringbarking and spraying a poisonous blue liquid on the exposed wood.

Here's 3 photos of what I found.

http://i48.tinypic.com/2zg6g5d.jpg

http://i48.tinypic.com/29cazc4.jpg

http://i48.tinypic.com/351z9ya.jpg

I don't believe they turn naturally blue like that after exposure.

[Anodyne]

The blue stuff looks a lot like roundup/glyphosate, so I'd go with option #2, they've been poisoned.

I doubt they're deliberately targeting tryptamine-containing species though - more likely part of a weed removal program.

Edited September 15, 2012 by Anodyne

[Gollum]

Wow, looks like poison to me. Its a sad site.

[whitewind]

Are you sure that's what you found - not an introduced species?

You do say you went on an IDing expedition, Wattles are really hard to ID if you're not sure what your looking at.. To me it looks like a deliberate council attempt to eradicate weeds rather than anything else.

[ballzac]

I think it's unlikely that there is any coordinated effort to remove tryptamine containing trees and agree that it's probably an effort to eradicate weeds. I've seen single acacia species really take over in certain areas that look to have been cleared in recent years. I have no idea what the implications of this is, nor how it is dealt with, but it seems like a much more likely explanation to me.

Pics of to help ID would be very insightful, even if you're personally sure you've IDed correctly, I think it would be of interest here

[WAGES]

 

I'm 100% confident that they were Acacia Floribunda and Acacia Longifolia. They weren't exactly invasive and it was in an area far from the track I was walking on. The younger Acacia .L's and .F's seemed to be untouched.

Not one other Acacia species were ring barked and I noticed around 5 or 6 different species of Acacia on the walk. Acacia Melanoxylon was absolutely everywhere, a few Acacia Baileyana and many different Globular shaped species.

On a sidenote, can anyone identify the Acacia in the photo below. My backyard is full of them.

Here's a photo to show that it was A. Longifolia.

And last of all, here's a photo to confirm they were also A. Floribunda. (Sorry about the small samples, I didn't want to hurt the trees anymore than they were.)

 

 

 

Edited September 15, 2012 by WAGES

[WAGES]

 

Just to add aswell, Psilocybin Mushrooms have been abundant in my area for the past 4 years, now all of a sudden this year the amount has dropped by at least 3/4.

All of the usual spots are now being sprayed by the local council ( The spray is a bright neon pinkish/purple colour ). Although I did see quite a few Amanita Muscaria mushrooms in Winter.

 

 

Edited September 15, 2012 by WAGES

[Foo]

This is unlikely to be the case but the blue could be from wipper snipper cable

I think #2 is the go. No idea why

[gerbil]

It's weed control with blue indicator dye, longifolia and floribunda are not part of the local indigenous ecology. Any other blue turning up with no herbicide application or application with no indicator dye is the blue stain fungus which is quite common.

You are more than likely looking at melanoxylon in your backyard.

Some spray workers deliberately spray mushrooms, but it's not a targeted conspiricy, just a handful of opportunistic arrogant fucks, nine times out of ten if they are hit it's off target damage. Pink/Reds no dramas in communication, it's the people harvesting actives that have deliberate or off target damage with blue indicator dye that is a concern, i.e. people think it's natural staining.

[DarkSpark]

Green corps groups often do the IDing, ringbarking and spraying. Often this is done by students that don't really want to be there or care. Could possibly be mistaken identity on a large scale by novices with knives and poison?

[gerbil]

umm what are you talking about? what mistaken identity? They hit longifolia and floribuna, species not indigenous to the local ecology, did you not read the responses?

[PositiveHAL]

i can confirm from personal experience that council do not spray mushrooms, i dont know where people get this idea from it's not the responsibility of local councils to enforce some anti drug crusade? the whole idea is laughable. I have no doubt that incidental herbicide spraying of mushrooms occurs from time to time when workers are carrying out weed spraying, but again this is herbicide not fungicide.

has it not occured to people that the reason why their mushroom patches are diminishing is because knowledge of the mushroom picking is becoming so widespread thanks to sites like the shroomery... not to mention seasonal fluctuations, weather, etc

also both those wattles are known to be very weedy, take a drive along the coast, you'll see

[gerbil]

Don't be confused though from it's natural distribution in Victoria in eastern sections and coastal areas, southern vic populations of subsp. longifolia are thought to be introduced yet somewhat naturalised, while subsp. sophorae supposedly with a natural distribution that includes the southern coast, still contentious and not fully understood (like all native plants), outside of the trickier distribution debate locations, the melbourne bushland suburban stuff is considered introduced and on ground can generally be witnessed what the source infestation was, i.e. even if it turns out that sophorae or longifolia is indigenous to non coastal areas of melbourne (hypothetical!), the occurances in specific suburban spots are somewhat easily traced to planted populations, not indigenous regeneration. I'd be concerned if you saw eastern and coastal populations being bumped off.

Edited September 16, 2012 by gerbil

[whitewind]

Just to add aswell, Psilocybin Mushrooms have been abundant in my area for the past 4 years, now all of a sudden this year the amount has dropped by at least 3/4.

All of the usual spots are now being sprayed by the local council ( The spray is a bright neon pinkish/purple colour ).

 

Perhaps the mushroom hunters brought in weed seeds on the soles of their shoes?

[chilli]

Psilocybin Mushrooms have been abundant in my area for the past 4 years, now all of a sudden this year the amount has dropped by at least 3/4.

 

Sounds like you raped those patches good.

[ThunderIdeal]

roundup powermax is blue (so are copper fungicides!) and probably blue enough to act as marker dye when barely diluted. the safest spray dye i'm aware of happens to be blue.

it's interesting this whole staining blue / sprayed blue issue! i think you'd have to be unlucky to pick a blue mushroom without noticing blue weeds everywhere.

[gerbil]

Thanks for that TI, powermax is a strong possibility then given that at least a few councils in the melbourne area have bright blue dabber heads, I always assumed additional indicator dye like some councils do, but your explanation seems more fitting in this context.

hah you'd think people would be that intelligent, but you give society too much credit, it's not uncommon to see people picking highly indicated plants and even if verbally communicated it can be met with a shrug and continuance of activity. On top of that and the reverse, the indication on leafy plants can often dissapear/meld quite quickly which doesn't give much hope for people to realise what's occured in the area.

anyway I hate talking about this stuff, so will leave it at that :D have a good one fella.

[phyllode]

If that's good 'weed control', then it's a bad waste of natural resources. And I don't just mean the 'goodies'. And how about all the local wildlife that's adapted and relies on them.

I don't support this at all. So-called Regeners f***off!

Edited October 27, 2012 by phyllode