Hello again, EnviroNews readers!
There's a very good reason we've popped into your inbox again so soon... This special edition is dedicated to celebrating an incredible group of volunteers who have helped care for and protect our local environment over the past three decades.
And while we're here, we'd also like to shine a spotlight on a resident feathered couple who may have flown under your radar in recent years, and how you can help safeguard their future this weekend on National Tree Day.
Let's get started...
Frankston Environmental Friends Network Celebrates 30 YEARS of Community Action 🎉
Photo description: FEFN at City Pride in 1997 (top) and at the Civic Centre with Mayor Sue Baker in 2026 (bottom).
The Frankston Environmental Friends Network (FEFN) is celebrating 30 years of passionate, community driven stewardship of Frankston’s natural environment. Since its beginning in the mid-1990s, FEFN has united local Friends groups and environmental advocates through a shared commitment to safeguard the creeks, wetlands, coastal vegetation and heathlands that make Frankston unique.
Formed on 14 August 1996 during a period of major change in local government and reserve management, FEFN emerged from grassroots concern about the future of Frankston's natural areas. By creating a coordinated voice for community volunteers, the network strengthened advocacy, improved communication between stakeholders, and helped to ensure that reserve management decisions reflected local knowledge and care. Since its lively first meetings, FEFN has been active in challenging inappropriate proposals and writing submissions that help shape positive environmental outcomes.
Over the last three decades, FEFN has supported collaboration across community groups, delivered training and field activities, educated the wider community, and consistently shown up to advocate for environmentally responsible planning and management. Its contributions have been recognised through a myriad of well-deserved awards and public acknowledgements, as well as enduring partnerships with Council and other organisations.
As FEFN marks this milestone anniversary, we celebrate not only their incredible achievements but its continuous and enduring power of community action. Frankston City Council would like to thank all the volunteers for their commitment to working together to play a vital role in protecting our natural environment for the future generations of our people, plants and wildlife.
JOIN US THIS SUNDAY! National Tree Day🌳26th July 2026
Photo description: Councillor Emily Green, Cr. Steffie Conroy and young volunteers planting tubestock in Lloyd Park, Langwarrin for National Tree Day 2025.
Our nursery team have been hard at work growing trees and shrubs for National Tree Day and we now have over 3000 plants ready to go in the ground. So please join us, as we could really use your help!
This year, Frankston's tree planting event will be held at Overport Park, one of our much loved and well used green spaces. National Tree Day is all about getting together with your community to create biodiversity, restore habitat and grow a greener future. Come along to get your hands dirty planting native trees and shrubs. And, after all the hard work is done, relax with fellow tree lovers over a free coffee and sausage sizzle.
📅 Sunday, 26 July 2026
⏰ 10:00am to 12:00pm
📍 Overport Park (enter via Somerset Road), Frankston South, VIC 3199
Please bring gloves and a hand trowel (if you have one)
Families, friends and nature lovers of all ages are welcome! Just register your attendance at the link below.
Photo description: National Tree Day 2025 volunteers enjoying a warm beverage & sausage sizzle after a hard day's work (left). Jana Mrazova, Council's coastal planner, welcoming volunteers with a big smile (right).
Photo description: Tawny frogmouth pair perching in tree (top). Individual Tawny Frogmouth basking in the sun (middle). Individual Tawny Frogmouth camouflaging in a tree (bottom). All photos courtesy of Tamara Keyte.
Frankston Fauna Files 🕵️♀️🦉🪶
Tamara Keyte, team leader of natural reserves, reports on our resident pair of Tawny Frogmouths...
Since 2021, a Tawny Frogmouth pair has quietly made a home amongst the trees at Overport Park and the neighbouring bushland. Most people walk past without noticing them because they are masters of disguise. They close their eyes, stretch their necks, and settle so still against the bark that they look less like birds and more like the broken limb of a tree. That is, until someone steps on a twig below then SNAP! their heads swivel and suddenly two enormous yellow eyes are fixed on the intruder below.
The stare comes from above a wide, frog-like mouth edged with what looks like a scruffy feathered moustache. One moment the bird seems aloof and unimpressed; the next, it appears to be glaring, as if demanding to know who dared to disturb its quiet afternoon. Making eye contact with a frogmouth is a memorable, and slightly unnerving, experience.
This pair’s presence in our park is more than a lucky sighting. Tawny Frogmouths mate for life, and a bonded pair often stay in the same area for more than 10 years. When breeding season arrives, their nest is hardly grand: just a loose, precarious platform of sticks, placed casually on a horizontal forked tree branch. Both parents take turns to incubate the eggs, but Dad is often the one settled on the nest during the day. Once the chicks hatch, the pair work together to raise the fluffy young.
Although Tawny Frogmouths are relatively widespread and common, they still face serious urbanisation pressures. Habitat loss reduces the places where they can perch, nest, and raise young, while some rodenticides can poison them indirectly through the prey they eat. In the bushland, they play an important role. When night falls, they snack on worms, snails, slugs, insects, rodents, frogs, and even moths caught in flight. But this skill also puts them in danger. Moths drawn to car headlights may lure frogmouths low over roads, where chasing a meal can lead to tragic collisions.
This year, Frankston's National Tree Day planting event will be held in Overport Park this Sunday, 26th July. The trees and shrubs we plant will help shape a safer future for this pair and others like them. As the next generation of plants grow, they will provide more perching and nesting sites, support a richer variety of insect prey, and strengthen the habitat that allows these quiet, watchful birds (not owls) to remain part of our local story.
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Frankston City Council acknowledges and pays respect to the Bunurong People, the Traditional Custodians of these lands and waters.
Council declared a Climate Emergency in 2019, formally recognising that we need to work together to meet the lower target of the Paris Agreement, which is to keep global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, preferably below 1.5 degrees Celsius. We are committed to working with our community to collectively reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and prepare and adapt to the impacts of climate change.
