On Tuesday, 8 December, the University of Melbourne’s Green Infrastructure Research group is hosting a 90-minute online workshop to outline the key maintenance requirements for a range of Australian green roofs.

Delivered as part of the Hort Frontier Green Cities project, ‘Researching the benefits of demonstration green roofs across Australia’ (GC16002), participants will gain a broad understanding of green roof maintenance considerations as well as detailed information on specific tasks for different types of large and small systems such as roofs for stormwater control, podium gardens and residential projects.

As the long-term benefits of green roofs such as rainwater capture, increased biodiversity and mitigation of urban heat islands become clearer, the importance of understanding green roofs becomes more important.

All greenlife stakeholders are encouraged to join the workshop including growers, designers, building owners and managers, developers, and landscapers.

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Thursday, 19 November 2020

Detected infesting field-grown vegetables in western Sydney in October, Serpentine leafminer has now been found across several horticultural cropping systems including production nurseries in the Greater Sydney area.

New South Wales Department of Primary Industries (NSW DPI) and Greater Sydney Local Land Services (GS LLS) are mounting a response to delimit the current distribution, with the aim to eradicate, or contain and control this pest.

Greenlife Industry Australia (GIA) has also been working with the Australian Pesticide and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) to secure a Minor Use Permit (MUP) PER88977, for the management of leafminers including Serpentine leafminer (SLM).

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Tuesday, 10 November 2020

Collection for the 2020 Nursery Industry Statistics survey is underway. But in order best represent the true value of Australia’s nursery industry, help from growers and nursery landscapers and retailers is needed.

Greater participation will address key data gaps for the nursery industry and provide a more accurate picture of its social and economic contribution. For the first time, we are also including landscapers and retailers in the survey will help identify greening trends to support future nursery production and improve availability of stock.

Findings from the study will help support our industry’s marketing and advocacy efforts.

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Tuesday, 10 November 2020

‘Where Will All The Trees Be?’ (NY19001) is the third instalment in a series of national canopy benchmarking reports that began in 2013 (following previous reports, ‘Where Are All The Trees’, and ‘Where Should All The Trees Go’). The project aims to ensure that as cities and suburbs expand and become consumed by infrastructure, that the importance of green cover isn’t left forgotten.

2020 Urban Canopy Benchmarking Report is now available, providing research results from 131 Local Government Areas (LGA) as to which places have the greenest cover, which are gaining and losing this cover and how poorer performing areas can learn from those who have successfully boosted their inclusion of greenlife.

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Friday, 5 November 2020

Serpentine leafminer has been detected infesting field-grown vegetables in western Sydney in October 2020.

These flies in the genus Liriomyza pose significant risk to Australia’s horticulture sector, and growers are urged to be vigilant with monitoring and implement rigorous plant protection protocols to reduce the risk of further infestation.

Current data suggests this leafminer has 365 host plant species from 49 plant families, including vegetables (cucurbits, tomatoes, chillies, brassicas, lettuce, etc), ornamentals (gerberas, roses, dahlia, chrysanthemums, petunias, violas, etc) and many common weed species.

Plants damaged by this pest commonly suffer reduced yield and growth, and in some cases are completely destroyed.

Serpentine leafminer is widely distributed across the Americas, Asia, Africa, Middle East and Europe, and has shown that it’s able to quickly develop insecticide resistance, making it difficult to control.

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Thursday, 5 November 2020

Hort Innovation has released its Annual Fund Reports, mapping out where levy-funds have been invested in 2019/20.

Summing up the year, the report gives a rundown of new, ongoing and completed R&D projects and in the case of the nursery industry, the inclusion of a marketing report.

Throughout the 2019/20 period, the nursery industry was faced with multiple challenges, from drought to bushfires, floods, the biosecurity thread of fall armyworm and the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Amidst these challenges, the industry pushed-on, investing $2.34 million in R&D and $808,000 in marketing.

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