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Beaumaris
Conservation Society Inc.
will
email
a .jpg file of the
original of the letter below to interested persons on request..
63 Durrant Street,

Brighton, S.5.,

VIC.

September 7th.,
1953
.
Mrs. E. Hosking,

       
President,


          
Beaumaris  Tree Preservation Society,

             
“Coronet Hill”, Coronet Grove,


                    
Beaumaris, S.10., VIC.
Dear Mrs.
Hosking,
                               
Your society is to be congratulated in its
endeavours to conserve good examples of the fast-disappearing
native tree growth at Beaumaris. Efforts, in collaboration
with the Native Plants Preservation Society, to secure for
posterity a sample of the local wildflower country is also
highly commendable.
                
As a professional botanist, I have visited the
great sand-plains of Western Australia which are world-
renowned for their unique native flowers – orchids, heaths,
banksias, grevilleas, honey-myrtles and many others in
rich diversity. No part of Victoria more closely resembled
these colourful Western heathlands that the sandy east
side of Port Phillip Bay, where a great wealth of showy
flowers once extended from the Heads all the way round
to Melbourne. Barely a vestige now remains, but on
the Dunlop Estate at Beaumaris one may still see a
limited display of heaths, wattles, wedding-bush, love
creeper, bush-peas, lilies and various orchids, unspoiled
as yet by encroaching weeds.
            
So that these may be available to another generation,
the need for a close reserve is urgent. I understand that

2.

Dunlop Rubber Ltd. is agreeable
to sell a selected portion of
the Beaumaris Estate (near Reserve Rd.), and I would be
happy to make recommendations for a site containing the
best wildflowers. If your society could raise some of the purchase
money, Sandringham City Council may be willing to pay
the balance? In any case, the most satisfactory arrangement
would be for the Council to accept landlord responsibilities,
and the area would need to be surrounded by rabbit-proof
fencing. Municipal authorities in other parts of the State
have co-operated splendidly with the Native Plants Preservation
Society, e.g. Seymour Shire Council which enclosed 3 acres
of bushland at Talla rook – now a “show place” -, Barrabool Shire’s
reserves along the Great Ocean Road near Anglesea,
and a remarkable survival of orchids recently enclosed by
Flinders Shire near Dromana.
                           
It would be tragic if the last chance to save
anything worthwhile of our vanishing Bayside flowers
were allowed to pass without the utmost effort by
those of us who have the fascinating indigenous
flora of Australia at heart.

                           
Yours faithfully,
                                                        
J.H. Willis
                                                       
Botanist at
                                                        
National Herbarium,
                                                               
SOUTH YARRA, S.E.1