Get your free Plastic Free July starter kit from Green Skills Albany during July, 2020! This little paper bag is full of information, vouchers, samples and freebies to get you started on your waste reduction journey. Drop into the office at 38 Graham Street, Centennial Park, Albany during 9-3 weekdays to pick up yours this month.

Plastic Free July is a challenge to refuse single use plastic for the month of July. Get tips, inspiration and sign up for the challenge here. You can also find resources here on the Green Skills website under our Resources tab. There is heaps you can do, even during these challenging pandemic conditions, to reduce single use plastic in your life.

Thanks to the Waste Authority of WA for supporting this project.

Dear Denmark Tip Shop customers and valued visitors – We greatly regret having to close the Tip Shop during this COVID-19 epidemic period. Green Skills assures you that we will reopen as soon as the Federal Government lifts the current restrictions placed on non-essential business trading. Our staff and customer’s safety is our primary concern and because we can’t ensure social distancing protocols as required under government regulations, we have decided that it is the right thing to do to close the Tip Shop. PLEASE do not throw away those items that you would otherwise donate to the Tip Shop but keep them in storage to donate to us when we reopen. We will be relying on our Denmark community’s support to help us re-build our Tip Shop into the thriving community business that it has been and will be as soon as we reopen. PLEASE do not leave any items at the Tip Shop gates, as we are not accepting goods at this time, and items left will just become a mess for someone to have to clean up when we open the gates to you all again. We will keep you posted on when we hope to reopen, but until we hear from the government, we can’t give any definite reopening date at this time, but keep an eye on the website because we hope that we will reopen soon.

Green Skills thanks you for your valued support to date, and we look forward to reopening our Tip Shop in the near future and re-building to normal activity when these difficult times are over.

It’s a sad day for the Perth Office as Aline says goodbye to Green Skills for the last time.

Aline has been a part of Green Skills since 2001 and in the last few years made an outstanding impact with her hugely popular Bees Wax Wraps workshops and Modern Cloth Nappies projects.

Her warmth and enthusiasm was infectious and the Perth Office will not be the same without her.

All the best for the future Aline. We are sure you’ll do amazing things.

Finishing January on a high with our biggest night planned yet. Do you celebrate Valentines Day or Easter? Then we have a range of gifts available for you this week. Waxiwraps will be here with their amazing sustainable solutions to reduce the need for single use plastic. Plants and fertiliser for the garden, fruit and veg, jams, sauces, soaps, woodwork, and new art work from Awesome Aboriginal and Kara Matters. Shale Pottery is having specials on this week.  You can have a tarot card experience reading by Shona. Great local food and coffee by Gin Lao, Bar Tarifa and Pla Thai and Quickshot Coffee.  Up-cycled wares from Vamp it Up and Sharee Orell are always popular.

Do you have hard to shop for people in your life? How about a buying a tour for your loved ones and visitors to experience our local and regional landmarks, wineries and restaurants? Award winning Busy Blue Bus will be available at the markets this week to answer your queries.

Local Proudlove Parade Town Team business La Botanic are having red cross specials on a range of house plants, Barletta’s and Yak On York have great dinner options too on Thursday Nights. And don’t forget the public lectures at the Wave Energy Centre from 5pm – 7pm.

We will have fantastic buskers from 4pm onwards.

Bandicoots, Birds and Eco-restoration program at Balijup farm near Cranbrook 16-2- Jan 2020

This Green Skills camp involved four days of Bandicoot and fauna trapping and other environmental monitoring on Balijup, a special property forming part of the Gondwana Link conservation program.

14 participants worked with wildlife biologist Andy McCreery, Alisia Lampropoulos, & Basil Schur of Green Skills and others on a range of citizen science monitoring activities at and near Balijup farm including bandicoot re-trapping,bird surveying ( with Andrew Dickinson), woodland cockatoo hollow survey & Sanctuary fence maintenance. Thanks to Aunty Carol Petterson, Noongar elder, for participating and for the enthusiastic support of the Balijup owners, Alan Hordacre, Anne Vanderbyl and Richard Hordacre.

The 111ha Sanctuary was launched in May 2015 with Bandicoots ( Quenda), re introduced into the enclosure from whiich foxes and cats are excluded.A

This project was supported by the WA Government’s State NRM program and the Koorabup Trust. It also formed part of the Festival of Birds and Biodiversity 2020, supported by Lotterywest, Great Southern Development Commission, BirdLife WA and Green Skills

A Quenda ( Southern Brown Bandicoot) about to be released after capture, tagging and measuring.

100 cage traps were set out in the 111 ha fenced Sanctuary enclosure

Capturing and carefully handling the fauna caught

Group processing and measuring animals before release

University students getting experience handling native fauna

Releasing a Quenda

A Brush tailed Possum about to be released after capture

Brush tailed phascogale – first one caught and photographed at the Balijup Sanctuary. Very exciting !

Sarah and Andrew doing a standard bird survey

Anne Vandberbyl ( one of the Co owners of Balijup) brought out scones, cream and home made jam for the hungry team!

Participants on the Cockatoo nesting hollow survey of the wandoo and Jarrah trees

Setting up a wildlife detecting camera in the Sanctuary

Sanctuary Fence maintenance work

Eco-restoration visit to Green Skills and Greening Australian revegetation sites on the Sandiland farm near Kendenup

Visit to the Green Skills bird hideA fam at Lake Matilda, near Kendenup

Aunty Carol Pettersen, Noongar elder, sharing her knowledge, including about sandalwood nuts as valuable bushtucker food

Spotlighting excercise near Lake Nunijup during the event

Ecorestoration visit to the Martagallup Pony Club lake wetland restoration site and constructed islands.

Group enjoying watermelon brought up by Alan Hordacre and partner Kylie.

The group in the Sanctuary about to embark on a Cockatoo nesting hollow survey of the wandoo and Jarrah treas

We are into the 3rd week of the January roll out of the Night Markets on Proudlove Parade. Thirty businesses from as far as Kojonup through to Denmark, Mt Barker in addition to Albany have showcased their wares and made the most of the opportunity to trade in the Proudlove Parade precinct on a Thursday night. You can find anything there from hand crafted new and up-cycled gifts, fruit and vegetables, honey jams and preserves, clothes, indigenous art, storage options, plants, soaps and candles, beauty products, garden products, jewellery pottery, beds and bbq’s, book a tour and great dinner choices from a variety of food vendors.

This week sees the inclusion of tarot card readings, music and the launch of the Albany Regional Volunteer Service BBQ trailer. This trailer will ultimately be providing breakfasts for the disadvantaged and homeless in Albany and manned by volunteers.

Next door to the markets at 5pm, the Wave Energy Center is conducting a public lecture on research that will be undertaken within the Bremer, Leeuwin, & Perth submarine canyons over the next month. Led by Dr Julie Trotter from the University of Western Australia and partnered with the philanthropic Schmidt Ocean Institute (SOI), the expedition has the rare opportunity to use deep-sea ROV technology to explore depths to ~4000 m. For the first time, high definition images will be captured and various fauna will be collected for analysis post-cruise, with a specific focus on deep-sea corals. A large seawater analytical programme will also be undertaken to investigate the unique conditions creating these hotspots of biodiversity.

The markets are open from 4pm to 9pm. Email [email protected] or call Anne Sparrow 0498 194 222 if you would like a stall next week.

Hundreds of locals, visitors and four-legged friends attended the inaugural Proudlove Parade Night Markets. Located under the trees in the car park, the ambience of the markets breathed vibrancy into the night-time of this precinct. A variety of market stalls from local businesses offering back to school and cooking displays from Harvey Norman, up-cycled, local and home-made items and produce, home-wares and storage, food,  tour operators offering experiences in our region and food vans with a range of choices for your dinner. Green Skills provided a hands-on opportunity to make bath bombs and created a very low waste event.

Local shopkeepers who formed the Proudlove Parade Town Team supporting the markets with Green Skills Albany and the Albany Chamber of Commerce and Industry, including Yak on York, La Botanic, Barlettas Albany and York St IGA offered specials on dinners, pot plants and more. Next week there will be even more specials on offer including workshops in La Botanic !

This all created a busy Thursday Night Shopping experience with vibrancy that filled both Proudlove Parade and lower Stirling Terrace which increased opportunity for all these local businesses to showcase their wares. The markets will operate initially on Thursday nights all through January. You can still book a stall for the upcoming weeks. Contact the Albany office on 9842 1334 or [email protected]