The block of land within Royal National Park near Heathcote East has an endangered ecological community known as the “Duffys Forest ecological community in the Sydney Basin Bioregion”
It occurs on the ridgetops, plateaus, upper slopes and occasionally mid slopes on Hawkesbury sandstone geology, typically in association with laterite soils and soils derived from shale and laminite lenses and on the ridge lines out from Bottle Forest Road this is exactly what we get. It is endangered because this is also a desired location for housing development. Thankfully, this area is within the NPWS estate.
While it is indeed a special area, it suffers from proximity to suburbs and easy access to a rail line and unfortunately there are many mountain bike tracks – some legal but many illegal unchecked expansion – that are leading to fragementation, erosion and loss of biodiversity values.
Despite that, it is worth looking at over the course of the changing seasons and even at this late stage in November, well after the major flowering, there was much to enjoy, if only people took the time to “walk slowly”
Our Natural World 