Priority number 1: To stabilise the banks around the pipe head under the road bridge, before the heavy winter rains.
Our good friend Leggy joined the rest of the Briggs/Barrett tribe on this Sunday the 5th of April, 2026, to begin operation sandbag and rock. Present were Grandma and Granda (Leonie and Robert Briggs), Ashleigh and Greg Nagle, Matthew and Stephanie Briggs, Charlie and Johnny Briggs, Darrell and Amelia Barrett, Trinity Barrett and Tristan Wagstaff, and Tony Legg. Caitlyn Barrett was excused from duty on account of being in Kalbarri and having to work the Easter weekend. Today’s plan was to use sandbags filled with a mixture of builder’s sand and concrete to fill in the worst of the eroded areas under the bank on the house side, and try and fill in the area around the road bridge pipe.
After the traditional Briggs/Barrett annual easter egg painting and egg rolling competition, Grandma fed us with a delicious Aussie themed Bavarian Breakfast. Then to work! Ash and Greg were mixing the sand/concrete mix (10% concrete to 90% sand) and filling sandbags, and Darrell, Matt and Ash were carting sandbags down to the creek, with the help of Charlie. The ‘soggy’ brigade consisted of Leggy, Trinity, Tristan and Amelia, who braved the leeches and the cold water to place the rocks and sandbags. Under direction from Leggy, we lifted the wobbly 2 x 4 beams on the house bank side, and stacked sandbags underneath. Trinity and Amelia then proceeded to fill the undercut bank area with sandbags, while Tristan and Leggy carted rocks from the creek bed up to the pipe head and placed them around the pipe.
The day was not without a couple of dramas – Leggy caught a nasty puncture wound to his finger when he found a rusty piece of wire, and Darrell managed to badly strain his back while carting around heavy sandbags. Despite these medical mishaps, a good days work was achieved. Our hope is that these repairs will hold through the winter rainy season which is fast approaching. The next step is to start revegetation of the creek banks. The plan is to use a mixture of grasses, sedges and ferns (mostly natives, but we will also utilise non-natives that are appropriate to the climate and not invasive) on the sloping banks and at the waters edge, and trees and shrubs with dense, soil stabilising root systems on the higher banks.
Trinity, Tristan, Amelia and Leggy in the creek, being supervised by Charlie!
Ash, Greg and Charlie were the sandbag brigade, filling the bags and bringing them down to the creek.
Project complete! As you can see, on the left hand side of the picture (the house side), sandbags have been used to fill in the undermined area under the two beams, and rocks have been seated in around the pipe head.
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