This 470 hectare reserve 8km from Piesseville on the Piesseville Jaloran Road is wonderfully diverse bush on a high ridge between the Arthur and Buchanan rivers. It stands as a lone remnant of an ancient gently sloping upland lateritic upland, which is shown in green and black colours on the radiometics image. Waterways leading away from it in all directions have eroded the surrounding landscape away, often down to more fertile soils formed from the underlying granite and dolerite bedrock.
There are no trails in the reserve apart from a short dead end road and a boundary track,which is suitable for 4 wheel drive vehicles. I can drive my 2 wheel drive ute on the boundary south of the main road, and for much of the northern side but am stopped by a steep breakaway on the western side and deep white sand on the east. It is a long walk to Wagin or Narrogin if you get stuck
It is a wonderfully diverse reserve, which reflects the immense age of our lateritic landscape where different plants have adapted to changes in soil type that may not be noticeable at the surface.These adaptations are so specific that I can predict the soil type as I walk through the bush. There is no sudden flush of wildflowers. One sees a scattering of different species, which change from place to place and month to month from July to November. A moderately fit person can experience these changes by walking along the boundary track.
To fully appreciate the landscape I walked through the reserve about every 3 weeks using Google Maps as a guide.
The underlying geology is reflected in landscapes and native vegetation in the reserve. There are several mafic stony/loamy laterite areas, which have eroded into steep breakaways and valleys covered in Brown, Blue, and Silver Mallet, dense mallee thickets, and Red Morrel trees. These starky beautiful areas with almost no understorey plants are particularly common on the west side of the reserve and the northern side of the road.
The following image shows them dominating the ridge which runs in an arc on the north side of the Jaloran Piesseville Road. They correspond with brown shaded bush areas.
It is a wonderfully diverse reserve, which reflects the immense age of our lateritic landscape where different plants have adapted to changes in soil type that may not be noticeable at the surface.These adaptations are so specific that I can predict the soil type as I walk through the bush. There is no sudden flush of wildflowers. One sees a scattering of different species, which change from place to place and month to month from July to November. A moderately fit person can experience these changes by walking along the boundary track.
To fully appreciate the landscape I walked through the reserve about every 3 weeks using Google Maps as a guide.
The underlying geology is reflected in landscapes and native vegetation in the reserve. There are several mafic stony/loamy laterite areas, which have eroded into steep breakaways and valleys covered in Brown, Blue, and Silver Mallet, dense mallee thickets, and Red Morrel trees. These starky beautiful areas with almost no understorey plants are particularly common on the west side of the reserve and the northern side of the road.
The following image shows them dominating the ridge which runs in an arc on the north side of the Jaloran Piesseville Road. They correspond with brown shaded bush areas.
A small stony mesa in the southeast corner has a grove of Labichea lanceolata, which I have only seen before in Tutanning Nature Reserve and interesting lichen covered niches amongst the ironstone.
 Mesa face |  Lichen in between the blocks |  Labichea lanceolata, |
The northeastern edge is a good spot to see vegetation changes where a breakaway has cut into the lateritic upland. You can drive around the edge with a robust vehicle. The following landscape image shows a typical bowl-shaped lateritic breakaway, which has cut back into a sandy and stony gravel upland.
Picture1 on the landscape image shows the edge of a breakaway, which has formed from erosion of a sandy gravel plain to the right of the image to form a kwongan gravel slope that changes in plant species as the soil becomes sandier downslope. In the background one can see a mallet thicket where the breakaway has entered a mafic ironstone/ loamy gravel area.
Pic 1 Granitic gravel breakway that merges into mafic gravel in the background
Pictures 2 and 3 show vegetation on the gravelly upland area.
 Pic 2. Ironstone gravel upland plain |  Pic 3. Sandier gravel with Eucalyptus albida mallee |
The slope on the top most edge of the breakaway has a grove of mallees on sand over clay soil.
 Pic 4. Prickly kwongan changes to mallee grove below breakaway. |  Pic 5. Eucalyptus thamnoides grove with breakaway in background |
Pic 6. Brown Mallet and Broom Bush The breakaway bowl valley has cut into the mafic bedrock to form red brown loams and loamy gravels that support Brown, Blue and Silver Mallet, Red Morrel, mallee woodland with little shub cover apart from patches of Melaleuca broombush.
 Pic 7. Red Morrel and mallees |  Pic 8.Silver Mallet, Red Morrel, mallees |
The breakaway bowl ends mid slope and a narrow Wandoo covered waterway passes in a narrow channel down a gravelly slope, and then widens to an attractive mixed vegetation spot adjoining the road.
Pic 9. wandoo scrub valley floor
Pic 10. Valley floor on right changes rapidly to a Wandoo prickly gravel scrub on either side.
This area is a good Spring wildflower spot.
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The western side of the reserve consists of a north-south lateritic ridge, which has been eroded on its western edge by Newman Brook to expose the underlying bedrock. A track from the road leading north on the western edge is a bit rough but is accessable for most vehicles up to the edge of a steep breakaway. A side track near the entrance leads to a parking spot in pleasant woodland. After passing this turnoff the track passes through sandy, loamy and rocky soils formed from granites and dolerite with attractive orchids and other spring wildflowers - particularly where the track enters Jam-Rock Sheoak bush and turns left.
(Pic X)
(Pic X)
 |  Pic X landscape |
I drive to one of my favourite spots by continuing uphill and parking in the corner where the track turns left again. A walk east into the reserve reveals an ancient lateritic landscape, which is shown on the following oblique image.This is a wonderful remnant of a subdued landscape of a North-South gravelly ridge merging into a sandy gravel and sand side slope, an ancient shallow waterway to the west, then another ironstone ridge. Distinct vegetation types, which can be seen on the map resemble a native garden as one walks through the bush.
The steep breakaway is part of a stony gravel rise with open Wandoo, Brown Mallet, Silver Mallet, mallee woodland, which is beautiful to walk through on a misty July morning.
 Pic B Stony gravel woodland |  Pic C Wandoo prickly scrub gravel adjoining the woodland |
After weaving through the prickly scrub, you come to a faint hollow of an old waterway bounded to the east by a gentle prickly gravel slope at the base of a stony gravel ridge. The waterway meanders downhill before merging into Wandoo-Rock Sheoak sandy patch, which has Cowslip and Green Spider orchids in September
Pic D. Barely visible Wandoo waterway separating sandy gravel on the left from stony gravel on the right
Pic E. Downslope the waterway merges into stunted mallee scrub then Wandoo rock Sheoak sand
Pic F. Wandoo Rock Sheoak sandplain with orchids in growing season
To the east the sandy woodland opens up into a gentle kwongan sandplain slope containing a range of shrub and herb species and the occasional Rock Sheoak, Nuytsia florabunda and Banksia attenuata trees. To the south the sandplain ends abruptly at a breakaway down to woodland below.
Pic G. Lateritic grey sandplain, which has many flowering species including Caladenia varians.
 Pic H.Trees lining a breakaway at rear of sandplain |  Stirlingia latifolia |
Pic I. Sandplain on the left terminates in a breakaway with Wandoo, Brown Mallet woodland below
Going upslope to the north a circular Eucalyptus adesmophloia patch stands out from the sandplain vegetation which changes to prickly Dryandra kwongan gravel.
 Hibbertia sp. |  Sandplain Styphelia sp. |
Eucalyptus adesmophloia patch on the edge of grey sandy kwongan
A north-south ridge upslope to the east from the mallee thicket is the oldest land surface of gravel with circular patches of Silver Mallet.
Silver mallet thicket surrounded by a range of vegetation types.
I was stunned to find a large mallet, which had toppled over recently to reveal a root system that grew almost entirely in 40cm of soil over a dense ironstone pavement. See more information on this amazing plant in this Foxypress.
 Silver Mallet Wandoo and Callitris Pine |  Dense root disc on fallen Silver Mallet |
The reserve on the south side of the Piesseville Jaloran Road consists of a patchwork of lower slope, and sudued upland lateritic soils. Much of it is easy to walk through and attractive woodland or kwongan, which is good birdwatching and mixed wildflower country. The reserve has not been burnt for many decades, and has retained rare sights like coral lichen growing below local sedges on sandplain.
Coral lichen growing under sedge
Wandoo kwongan mosaic
Granite outcrop
Mixed sandplain. I found purple enamel orchids in late October