Aranda nursery to grow 160,000 trees to aid bushfire recovery

Volunteers gather every Wednesday to work together to grow plants that will help revegetate bushfire-ravaged properties throughout the southern tablelands.

The nursery usually grows 120,000 plants per year but thanks to a grant from the Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife, that number will be boosted to 160,000.

Operations lead for Greening Australia ACT and NSW Graham Fifield said threatened species such as the glossy black cockatoo, koalas and swift parrots could eventually find a home in these trees.

"With the recent bushfires we're finding a lot of fauna is moving out of those burnt areas adjacent to farming land. So it's really important for us, in combination with with landholders, to provide additional habitat in addition to what sits within the national park system."

After years of drought, Mr Fifield said there had been a spike in the number of landholders looking for trees to reforest land as Australia enters a promising wet period caused by the La Nina phase.

"The demand is a bit overwhelming sometimes but it's obviously a good problem to have, people wanting to plant as much as they can, and obviously that's a very emotive subject, bushfires, as well so people are very keen to do their bit."

First-time volunteer Peter Fogarty saw the effects of the bushfires first hand as a volunteer firefighter with the NSW Rural Fire Service at Shannons Flat.

"It was just a lot of hard work, putting in containment lines and being there when the fire was raging, seeing the damage, seeing how fast it moved. But since then seeing the damage in a big way, the extent that the ACT got burned," Mr Fogarty said.

"But at the same time the natural recovery is pretty amazing too. We've had the rain so the bush is on its way to recovery."

He finally managed to book a place in the popular volunteer role to contribute tangibly to the bushfire recovery.

Varieties including Blackwood, Black She-oak, Myrtle tea-tree and Ribbon Gum will be grown from seed at the nursery until they are ready to be planted in autumn next year.

The Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife chief executive Ian Darbyshire said the charity decided to put its funding into community nurseries so they could scale up their operations.

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The Aranda nursery will be upgrading the irrigation system, benches and trolley as well as spending the funds on essential supplies such as potting mix, trays and pots.

The charity is aiming to fund the planting of one million trees in the next five years and is open to sponsorship large and small.

"We're trying to encourage people to think around Christmas that instead of having the Christmas tree, for $10 you can plant a tree that will go off and be part of the recovery of Australia," Mr Darbyshire said.