Brogo Reserve
Sitting at the top of NSW's Bega Valley, Brogo Reserve is one of the largest areas of intact native bushland left in the region.
Hidden within the steep entanglement of the NSW Illawarra Escarpment lies a small but magical place – ‘Nameless’ Sylvan Reserve.
The first Europeans to venture here would have been searching for Red Cedar – the tall, majestic rainforest trees that turn copper red when flushed with new growth.
Known by sawmillers as ‘red gold’ during the early days of settlement, they were highly prized on international markets and for many years were the most valuable trees in NSW.
Now, along with the Illawarra subtropical rainforests it once dominated, it’s a rarity protected only in a handful of places, including ‘Nameless’.
Image Information
Buttress roots of a Small-leaved Fig at Nameless Reserve. Photo by Joshua Wellington.
An endangered community
Illawarra subtropical rainforest is an endangered ecological community in NSW, so its ongoing protection on this reserve is crucial.
This mesmerising place also hides Irwin’s Creek, a playground for Freshwater Crayfish and Swamp Wallabies.
Below the rainforest canopy is an understory filled with native vines, lianas, shrubs and scramblers, and high up in the trees perch epiphytic ferns and orchids – plants that take nutrients from the bark and leaf litter of other plants.
All this is protected thanks to our generous supporters.
What Nameless Sylvan Reserve protects
Species found in this type of rainforest and protected at ‘Nameless’ include:
Animals: Superb Lyrebird, Green Catbird, Logrunner, Spotted-tailed Quoll (nationally endangered) and Southern Leaf-green Tree Frog.
Plants: Red Cedar, White Cedar, Native Pepper.
Vegetation communities: Illawarra escarpment subtropical rainforest (Endangered Ecological Community), Warm temperate rainforest, Escarpment moist blue gum forest, Moist coastal white box forest.
Image Information
Blue argus butterfly on a Lantana flower. Photo Wayne Lawler/EcoPix.
What we’re doing
Introduced into Australia as an ornamental plant, Lantana has become one of Australia’s most invasive weeds.
At ‘Nameless’ this low, scrambling, woody shrub can smother areas where there are breaks in the canopy, and can stop native plants regenerating naturally. By removing this noxious weed we’re giving the rainforest a chance for self-renewal.
This sort of bush regeneration has no doubt contributed to the return of the Noisy Pitta, one of Australia’s most spectacular rainforest birds. It's been recorded on the reserve multiple times in recent years, much to our delight.
What’s in a name?
When this property was generously donated to us by Louise Sylvan, it came with subtropical rainforest and Lyrebirds, but it didn’t come with a name.
The title ‘Nameless’ was chosen by Louise’s late husband Richard Sylvan, a philosopher and environmentalist, whose foresight secured the land for conservation. Richard was interested in the philosophical question of what it means when humans assign a name to something in the natural world.
According to Louise, “the ambiguity of the reserve’s name pleased him – the reserve is nameless, yet it does actually have a name.”
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