Hardy Gully Nature Walk (Sherbrooke)
Hardy Gully Nature Walk is a 700 metre (15-20 minute) loop starting from the northern end of Grants Picnic Ground in the Dandenong Ranges National Park. The walk is rated easy (suitable for beginners).
The forest area you will be walking through has ancient origins dating back over 60 million years when Australia was part of Gondwana. During that time rainforests covered most of the continent. As the climate changed, so did the plant types, as they adapted to the different conditions.
The surrounding Sherbrooke Forest houses important patches of remnant Cool Temperate Rainforest, which need to be protected as rainforests around the world have been reduced dramatically. Signs along the way introduce you to the forest environment and helps you understand its relationship between varied native plants and animals.
Sherbrooke Forest Grants Picnic Ground Loop Walks Map
At Grants Picnic Ground there are toilets, many picnic tables and BBQs, large shelter with four tables and water tap. There is also a cafe on site.
Access for Dogs:
Dogs are not permitted at Grants Picnic Ground or on the walks.
Review:
A lovely introduction to the rainforest environment of this area with the track being immersed in tree ferns and mossy trees. Keep an eye out for fungi in the cooler and wetter months. There is plenty of informative signage beside the track. The walk branches off to the right from the Lyrebird Loop Walk (after 50m) and then rejoins that track at Cooks Corner to get back to the picnic ground.
Information Signage
Living with dinosaurs
Heavier footsteps than yours once walked among ferns like these.
Seed ferns - prehistoric plants with fernlike fronds, the ancestors of today's treeferns, grew around 300 million years ago.
Fossil records reveal that some of the dinosaurs which then roamed the earth fed on these ferns.
Left: Soft tree-fern (Dicksonia antarctica)
Right: Rough tree-fern (Cyathea australis)
When your lease is up
When a forest tree dies or falls, it still has value. It supplies food and housing to new tenants.
Tree hollows are homes for birds, possums, gliders and bats. On the ground millipedes, centipedes, slaters and earthworms move in as fallen trees slowly decay, and in turn are food for lizards and echidnas.
Snakes also shelter under logs.
Open air concert
Stop and listen!
The forest's master mimic, a Superb Lyrebird (Menura novaehollandiae), may be nearby.
Lyrebirds mimic the sounds of other birds and sometimes human sounds as well.
Males sing to proclaim their territory, and to attract a female for mating.
World record trees
Sentinels of the forest, Mountain Ash (Eucalyptus regnans) are the world's tallest flowering plants. They can exceed 100 metres in height and live for 500 years.
Most of the Mountain Ash around you are young. They regenerated after a wildfire in 1923, which burnt much of the forest.
But some trees in moist gullies survived. These are now 200 to 250 years old.
A foothold in the forest
Amidst the tangle of trees, ferns and bark smaller plants known as 'Epiphytes' grow. You can see these growing on trunks and limbs of trees, migrating upwards towards the light.
Lichens, mosses, smaller ferns and some orchid species depend on a host plant. They do not take nutrients but just rely on a foothold to help them reach the light so they can continue to survive.
Kangaroo fern (Microsorum pustulatum)
The forest has many storeys
There are four layers or storeys of vegetation here — towering Mountain Ash trees, smaller trees like wattles, lower shrubs, and ground-level grasses, herbs, fungi and leaf litter.
Each storey supplies food, shelter and nesting materials for different animals, and contributes to the forest's web of life.
Main course - solid wood (eat slowly)
Did you know that fungi use fine networks of white threads to penetrate solid wood and consume it one cell at a time?
Fungi are vital to the forest's health. They convert living or dead matter into food substances for plants and animals.
You can see a great variety of fungi in the forest during winter.
Location
12 Coles Ridge Track, Sherbrooke 3789 View Map
Web Links
→ www.parks.vic.gov.au/places-to-see/sites/grants-picnic-ground-hardy-gully-walk
→ Dandenong Ranges National Park (Sherbrooke Area) Loop Walk Map
→ www.parks.vic.gov.au/places-to-see/sites/grants-picnic-ground
