​A string of reserves centered on a chain of salt lakes in the Arthur River stretches down from Lake Toolibin (the last remaining wheatbelt freshwater lake). The rest of the lakes are saline, but were fresh or brackish up to the 1950’s.

​​The area was surveyed for farming from 1904 to 1907. The Nomans Lake hall was built in 1911 and is still in use. The surveyor Oxley passed through the area in the 1890’s, although prior to this, shepherds and sandalwood cutters were in the district. Abundant food and water in the lake must have been very important for Noongar tribes, but no evidence remains. Diseases spread by contact with Europeans decimated these people and destroyed their social structure in the 1880’s, and access to the lakes was progressively reduced by land clearing and farming.
Local farmer Stan Prideaux’s recollection of the lakes during the depression states ‘One pleasant recollection from those days was the state of the environment. The lake systems were generally full each year. Timber in and around the lakes was alive and the water only slightly brackish. Waterfowl abounded in the lakes – swans, ibis, heron, duck, water hen and other. Ground birds and birds of the forest were also plentiful – plovers, ground larks, sky larks, curlew, parrots, galahs, swallows, quail, black and white fantails – to mention some’. Source: Nomans Lake a Collection of Memories.  Heidi Astbury and Lyn Chadwick 1987.
Today the lake beds are bare or dotted with dead trees and salt tolerant plants, but vegetation in surrounding uncleared land is often in excellent condition. The area is seldom visited because few lakes can be reached by road and surrounding saline areas are uninviting. With much walking I discovered starkly beautiful and varied salt lakes in a range of landscapes with surrounding areas of saline flats and often attractive healthy woodland.  

​The area is a great example of the WA Wheatbelt’s ‘reversed’ rivers’ - In most areas of the world, rivers start as small active streams in mountains and become larger and more sluggish as they approach the coast, but many large wheatbelt rivers start in subdued  plains and become more active as they pass through the hilly Darling Range to the ocean.
The Arthur River is ancient and begins in the old plateau sandplain landscape east of Toolibin before passing between uplands associated with the Binneringie Dyke to the North and a large ridge associated with the Buchanan River to the south. A chain of lakes merged into the extensive Narrogin Valley flats, then narrowing as it passes into the Darling Range to Join the Blackwood. The river system tributaries and associated uplands frequently run in northwest-southeast and southwest-northeast patterns, which reflect fractures in the underlying crystalline bedrock caused by repeated supercontinent collision and separation cycles.

Why are there lakes in this particular area? here are some clues.
There is a paleochannel (buried river) system 300m wide and 40m deep beneath Toolibin lake and extending approximately five kilometres upstream in a north-westerly direction. Paleochannel sediments are about three million years old, which coincides with uplift of the Darling Range.
The lake system ends immediately above the intersection of the Yilliminning and Arthur Rivers. From that point the Arthur River channel becomes more actively flowing and highly saline. Much of the valley containing the lakes has healthy natural vegetation and mild salinity. A farmer told me that the lakes filled upstream from Little White Lake. Perhaps this coincides with flooding of the Yilliminning River.
An exaggerated terrain map I created shows that Ibis to Noman lakes pass through a gap between uplands on either side. I think that faulting and uplift possibly associated with from the Darling Range uplift reduced river slope where it joined the Yilliminning River and promoted lake formation. Some lakes are separated by dolerite dykes.

​Lake Descriptions

The following hyperlinks contain information on Lake Toolibin and salt lake formation as illustrated by Lake Taarblin. 
Cars can drive to the southern end of Taarblin from Williams Kondinin and Lakes roads. The lake was a popular water skiing, fishing, and picnic spot before it became saline. Taarblin is an enormous lake, which is separated from Ibis Lake to the south by a barrier formed by a dolerite dyke and adjoining heat-hardened granite. The dyke is exposed on the steep red clay  southeast bank. and boulders from the adjoining granite are artfully scattered on the shoreline. If you look closely you will find shells of tiny snails, which I also found in other lakes in the chain that fill most often. Good spot for landscape artists and photographers

Taarblin overflow passes through a  culvert under Lakes Road  into a  channel to Ibis Lake. In the early days, the road could only be traversed by a boat in winter. Remains of the old Astbury house can be seen by the water channel. Ibis Lake's name name suggests that this lake once teemed with waterbirds (I found shotgun cartridges and snail shells). The lake is now bare and saline. East of the lake is a salty depression, which contains a soak that has become saline. This is bounded by a dolerite rise (which was Bill Astbury's favourite paddock).  Water from salt land to the east enters another inlet on the south of Ibis lake and exits again a bit further along.

The waterway then enters and exits the south side of Billy Lake. All lakes have surrounding sandy dunes covered by salt tolerant shrubs, Casuarina obesa-Salt sheoak, and scattered paperbark trees and shrubs, but the dunes are larger around Billy Lake. I think that this is an indication that the lake fills less frequently. This lake has no defined waterway from the north apart from a man-made drain. Runoff appears to come from the wide valley above in flood years via numerous gilgai depressions covered by paperbark, broombush and salt tolerant vegetation. The lake itself is bleak, with a silty floor dotted with dead trees and bushes.   

Once again, water exits Billy Lake and enters Bokan lake from the south, which is repeated downstream. The lake chain also tends to lie on the northern edge of the wide valley.
​Aha, this is probably due to another geological influence on the lake system. Likely causes are the South Coast Jarrahwood Axis uplift, and the Australian Plate slowly subsiding beneath Indonesia, causing the continent to tip down to the north. Ancient rock platforms on the south coast indicate that the coast has risen by about 130 metres in the last 20 million years or so. 

Bokan Lake was the first lake in the chain with water I visited, and is quite scenic. It receives water quite often from creeks from a  large catchment to the north. I managed to drive down to the lake from Lakes Road through a saline flat on a  summer only track, but this is very boggy country. 

Runoff from Bokan Lake reaches Nomans lake, which adjoins the Wagin Wickepin Road. This lake was a popular recreation area in the early settler days.
White Lake is a forbidding site - a large circular and mostly bare area with a compacted floor ringed by low dunes. The lake directly adjoins a rise on its north side and only receives water when the main channel to its south flows. Clouds of acrid dust were blowing fom the lake bed when I visited.

Little White Lake is the last lake in the chain. Water flows into it frequently due to a large and mostly fresh water catchment to the north that flows through a salty flat dotted with dead trees to reach the lake. Despite the forbidding stretch of salt land one needs to cross to reach the lake,it is very interesting. I found several old nesting boxes, which had been nailed to trees on the eastern side indicating that someone valued the wildlife here at some time. 

The northen end of the lake floor contained typical dead trees and bare saltland, but an aerial image shows numerous mounds in the southern part. The sandy mounds are about 1.4 metres high surrounded by a shallow ditch. They resemble elevated bird nests but are a mystery. I also found a few old swan nests in clumps of dead trees in the lake.

I was surprised by the variation and amount of healthy woodland surrounding the lakes. There was Salmon Gum, York Gum, and Red Morrel woodland most likely growing over dolerite dykes, and mixtures of Wandoo, Salt Sheoak, York Gum, paperbarks and rushes.intermixed with saltland heath. I enjoyed seeing the vegetation changes as I walked through, and would enjoy seeing which seasonal flowers occur in the growing season. It is a pity that the area is difficult to access.
Woodland examples are shown below. 

​The Narrogin arboretum was one of more than 50 demonstration plantings established by the then Forests Department, throughout the wheatbelt, in the 1950’s and 1960’s. The arboreta were developed to evaluate a range of local, regional, Australian and overseas species that were thought to have promise for planting in the wheatbelt and goldfields, with a focus on species for quality timber, dust control and for windbreaks.
Before this the only tree seedlings available were Sugar Gum-Eucalyptus cladocalyx, Brazilian Pepper-Schinus terebinthifolius, and Kurrajong-Brachychiton gregorii from the Forest Department Hamel nursery. I often see the first two trees at early farm homesteads. LIvestock don't eat them.
The Narrogin arboretum, smaller than most, was added to over several years as new species became available, with the last trees being planted in 1969.
In the last couple of years well established tree in the arboretum have died. As part of a search for possible causes I obtained the DBCA file containing the original planting map, and a report on arboreta success by George Brockway in 1965.
Brockway never ceases to amaze me: he is truly a legendary forester and conservationist, who initiated the arboretum project with a series of trials in 1946 as the Kalgoorlie District Forestry Officer.

The Narrogin arboretum is more difficult than most to evaluate because it lacks a uniform soil type and planting date, and has an ephemeral creek running across its centre. Plantings range from 1955 at the eastern end to 1966 at the west. Soil types range from Marri loamy sand to the west grading downslope to York Gum clay loam in the east, and species have been roughly planted according to their reputed appropriate soil type.
Another complication is the warming and dryer climate. E. rudis-Flooded Gum trees, which  grew on in sandy surfaced soil on the southern side of the arboretum have all died except for a clump below a street drain outlet on Range Road. Other apparently healthy large trees in Foxes Lair abruptly died in the last two years, including a large Tasmanian Blue Gum. Similarly a row of E. Lane-pooleii trees (with the exception of one adjoining a drain) on loamy sand on the western end of the arboretum died in the past 3 years. They survived for 70 years as attractive mini-versions of trees in their natural range. ​Despite this, some WA higher rainfall species have thrived and many Goldfields species have done poorly. Why do E. gomphocephala-Tuart (southwest coastal sand), E. preissii-Bell Fruited Mallee (south coast species) do so well here?

• ​Brockway noted that imported species tend to be more successful in arboreta than locals, because insect pests do not recognize them as being edible. This is very evident at Narrogin in excellent growth of most Eastern States trees, and perhaps the Tuarts. He specifically mentioned wood boring beetles, but termites and stink bugs are the main culprits at Narrogin. The damn stink bugs are everywhere. When I plant seedlings in Foxes Lair I have to cover susceptible species with fly mesh for a few seasons to stop the growing points being sucked dry.

A thriving local exception is E. longicornis-Red Morrel which is found on salty loams and red clay-gravelly clay soils, but an adjoining Salmon Gum row is sickly.
​Brockway also noted that tree plantings were more successful after a crop than in cleared bush. Factors involved include

• ​Seedling response to fertilizer, particularly phosphorus.
• Retained subsoil water
• Fewer insects

​​Pines, and Casuarina obesa-Salt Sheoak have grown very well, but some pines are approaching the end of their life.
Most mallees have thrived in the arboretum, particularly on the upper slopes. Oil mallees planted on heavy soil (E. kochii subspecies kochii and plenissima) have persisted on the heavy soil but are attacked by stink bugs. E. kochii subsp. kochii did not persist on a sandier row.

​Mallets are another story. These WA eucalypts are obligate seeders, which lack lignotubers and tend to grow on very hard setting and heavy clays, and  breakaway slopes. E. spathulata-Swamp Mallet, was a Brockway recommendation, and I would have agreed twenty years ago. A once magnificent row (pegs 159-163) have mostly collapsed from termite infestation. The original map showed an earlier planted  row further east in the arboretum on clay soil, which are just termite eaten holes in the soil.

 Other failed mallets are E. diptera, E.campaspe, and E.gardnerii. Three species have persisted: local E. astringens-Brown Mallet, E. Stricklandii (a straggly Goldfields species), and E. platypus- Moort.
​Mallets appear to have a shorter life than trees and mallees.
E. spathulata has exquisite bark in autumn, and one of them was the official hugging tree. Alas, no longer.

Moort is a small mallet which forms dense thickets on hard setting southern clay soils. It has adapted well to fire by excluding other plants while living and shedding huge amounts of seed when burnt.
Plants in the Narrogin arboretum row are continuously infested by termites that cause branches to snap regularly, but the moorts still thrive and flower prolifically.

​Brockway also highlighted seedling survival problems due to overgrown seedlings with coiled roots. I don't think that it was a problem at Narrogin, but the problem persists today. My DBCA buddy Peter White who assists urban landcare groups in his spare time is frustrated by nursery produced overgrown seedling with coiled roots, which are a widespread cause of revegetation failure.

Even the small and insignificant have their moment in Foxypress. I have also been described as small, but hopefully not insignificant :}
​Recently I noticed shrubs with what I thought were silvery fluffy flowers in open woodland opposite the Nomans Lake Hall, and I had great trouble identifying them.
The reason is that I saw masses of winged seeds, which are not shown in ID guides and the flowers are incredibly small.   
Spyridium is an Australian genus in the Rhamnaceae family, which is noted for having tiny flowers. Spyridiums are known as basket flowers because their flowers are clustered inside cup-like bracts.

​To flower in autumn on dense gravel soil Spyridium microcephalum has to be a tough plant, hence the woolly flowering stems and leaves, and tiny flowers.
Each flower has a ring of white feathery sepals enclosing a tubular corolla (petal tube). Anthers are clustered at the end of the tube, and a lobed stigma pokes out (probably after the anthers have died to prevent self pollination

​After pollination the corolla tube falls out and the sepal ring grows out like a badminton shuttlecock with the seeds enclosed at its base. It then flies away in the wind leaving the expanded 'basket' bracts, which look like a flower to the unwary.
What an amazing little plant! I wonder what tiny insect pollinates them?

A side effect of agriculture in the district has been a lack of regular fires to regenerate vegetation on unmanaged reserves. They become weedy and clogged with dead material for decades then razed by devastating bushfires.
​Unfortunately bushfires are becoming more common and more intense. After the February 2022 wildfire, which started near North Yiiliminning Nature Reserve, I established photomonitoring sites at Birdwhistle, North Yilliminning, and Ockley nature reserves to record landscape changes.
​
The Birdwhistle Rock site monitors recovery of a predominantly granitic rock lansdcape. I only have one pre-fire image below of this reserve because it was weedy and overgrown. Vegetation on the rock had not been burnt for decades and the mostly Rock Sheoak vegetation areas were clogged with dense wild oats and dead sheoaks. 

The intense heat incinerated all surface life and even caused cracking and exfoliation of outcropping rocks.​ The heat caused the equivalent of thousands of years of erosion in a single event as flakes up to one centimetre thick fell off to reveal unweathered underlying granite.

Succeeding years have been a revelation. I found fire ephemeral species previously unrecorded in this area, and am intrigued by soil specific species remergence, dominance, and succession.

Within two months some Hakea petiolaris plants were resprouting. Note the swollen base on the following image, which indicates considerable age. Other shrubs such as Calothamnus quadrifidis, and Balga grass trees resprouted a bit later. Wandoos completely lost their bark and took much longer to resprout at ground level. Images below show Hakea and Stypandra glauca regrowth

​Ash beds from burnt trees were rapidly colonised by a bright orange flowering moss, which is gradually declining after the third year.
Stypandra glauca (Lamb Poison) regrew from tubers in the 2022 season, as dense colonies in rock cracks and shallow rocky soil. Before the fire it was relatively inconspicuous. This is another tough plant. The fire was so intense that it burnt surface soil organic matter, but didn't phase the Stypandra. 

Images below are from the base of the rock where the soil is shallow with numerous rock fragments and flakes washed down after the fire.

Rock cracks and the  main channel contained Stypandra glauca and shrubs before the fire, but Stypandra is now dominant.

Deeper soil areas were mainly ash and moss in the first winter/spring with orchids (mostly red beak and cowslip orchids,  a few Caladenia integra  and a profuse germination of Kennedia prostrata  (Running Postman).

I wish I paid more attention to other usually insignificant resprouters that popped up sporadically, as they included bush tucker plants. Shown below are 

Gyrostemon subnudis is a wiry fire ephemeral shrub, which usually lives for less than ten years. It completely took over some rocky sandy soil areas. It has male and female plants (dioecious). Female flowers and fruit resemble minipumpkins. By spring 2024 many plants were being eaten by spittlebugs and Rock Sheoaks were overtaking them.
​
The sequence below is a Rock Sheoak thicket adjoining the parking area.

Deeper loamier soils in valleys suffered soil erosion initially, but species that germinated grew very quickly, particularly grasses, Acacias (mainly Acacia saligna and Acacia acuminata) and rock sheoaks. Wild oat seedlings in the occasional less burnt spots are growing profusely, and will gradually spread throughout these areas.
​Valley on east side of the rock.

This site on the old sandalwood collectors track was Rock Sheoak /Wandoo / Acacia woodland. It is being populated by a wider range of species.  

A big surprise was the appearance of native grasses and Kennedia prostrata on sandy soils on the west side of the rock. Kennedia seeds were more fire resistant than the grass. There are dense patches of mainly Austrostipa species in less severely burnt spots.

Shakespeare wrote 'What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculty....'
Blah blah one doesn't have to look far to see that as utter rubbish, but to his credit Hamlet's speech moves on to our flawed reality.
If only Shakespeare was around to praise Lobelia gibbosa Tall Lobelia, which is a true wonder of nature.

Lobelia gibbosa is a spindly annual herb about 15cm tall with a thickened stem and scale leaves, which flowers now amongst leaf litter on Marri open forest sands and sandy gravels. It is an amazing achievement for an annual to flower, ensure that it is pollinated, and provide seeds for the next season in midsummer.
​Single flowers open one at a time. The exquisite little blue and white flowers are difficult for humans to see, but the plant has evolved ingenious measures to ensure pollination by  insects
​
Here are the plants' secrets

Root System - this is mind blowing!
For more information see page 257 of this book.
Lobelia gibbosa roots form a symbiotic relationship relationship with a fungus, which is called an ericoid mycorrhiza (mainly found in in the Ericaceae shrub family on poor sand and gravel soils.) Like many orchids, germinating Lobelia seeds won't develop without mycorrhizal fungi. Ericoid mycorrhizas generally develop at 15 to 60  cms below the soil surface.
Somehow the tiny Lobelia seeds manage to get 15 to 25cm below the surface, germinate, and form a clump of thick mycorrizhal roots (called coralloid roots) that are fed by the fungus through winter and early spring. The fungus could even be transferring nutrients to the Lobelia from other plants via mycorrhizas. This provides nutrient and water storage for the Lobelia, which sends up a bean like shoot after a month to begin the normal leaf formation, growth and flowering processes.

Plant structure
When the soil dries the plant acts like a succulent using stored water in the root system and thickened stem, which gradually dries up from the base. 

​Colour
Vertebrates with red/blue/green vision can't easily distinguish small pale blue and white flowers from light brown leaf litter.
Insects can't see red and white, poorly see yellow and brown, but have good green and blue vision. A big addition is ultraviolet (UV) and insects see the colours differently depending on whether the plant tissue reflects or absorbs UV light. For an insect, blue flowers really stand out from brownish leaf litter.

Pattern
Insect eyes readily detect movement, and they are attracted to irregular edged objects that are symmetrical. Think of the rounded symmetry of daisy flowers and bilateral (right/left) symmetry of pea ... and Lobelia flowers.
A flower's reproductive parts the pistil and stamens, absorb UV light to protect them from damage, and look dark to an insect. Many flowers have (insect vision) dark bullseye spots at their centre and streaks resembling stamens to lead insects into the flower.

Precise Pollination
To ensure that each insect visit results in pollen transfer Lobelias use a sneaky mechanism called secondary pollen presentation.
The most common flower structure shown in the diagram (courtesy madaboutscience.com.au) has separate male and female parts with stamens that usually surround the female pistil. There is great variation depending on the plant species and type of pollinator.
If you look at the Lobelia flower, these are absent, but are simulated by white patterns.

A side view of the flower reveals the secret.
Five petals are fused into three lobes to make a tube for the insect to enter. I suspect that Lobelias lack sufficent stored moisture to produce nectar but rely on visual mimicry as do most orchids.
Stamens are united to form a tube containing the pistil, which pokes through the upper lobes and ends at the upturned ends. Anthers surrounding the inside of the tube at the (brown marked) end release pollen into it. The style slowly elongates up the stamen tube until its thickened  end (stigma) grows through the anther ring and like a piston, pushes a plug of pollen out to the hairy tip.
Insects pushing into the flower lift and part the upper petal lobes to reveal the pollen-covered stamen tube tip, which smears pollen on to the insect's back. The slow piston action enable the flower to recharge the tip for several insect visits.

Some days later when remaining pollen has died, the style emerges from the stamen tube into the flower allowing the stigma to unfold and reveal its inner receptive surface. As an insect enters the flower pollen from its back brushes on to the lobes and pollinates the flower.

Postscript
Later I found a group of roosting male blue banded bees in the vicinity, and read that they prefer blue flowers.