Indeed, their role in nature is acknowledged today when environmental projects are undertaken on cleared land.

Logs are sometimes introduced in recent plantings in an attempt to "re-age" a site.

The logs add an element that might otherwise take 100 years to appear.

Logs provide habitat for numerous animals including echidnas, reptiles and very many invertebrates such as cockroaches, centipedes and grubs.

Many of the smaller creatures feed on the decaying wood. Damp logs are broken down - over many years - by fungi including the jelly fungus, shown in the accompanying photo.

Logs host a range of special log fungi, which do not grow on the ground or among the leaf litter. This jelly fungus is very much a log dweller.

Logs are important habitat for birds such as brown treecreepers, and also for mammals such as phascogales and antechinuses.

Ducks, herons, cormorants and tortoises readily perch and rest on any logs included in new wetland projects.

The importance of logs for fish is now widely recognised too, with logs often placed in rivers to provide suitable shelter and breeding places for a variety of fish species.

The banded stilt is an uncommon and irregular visitor to the Ballarat district. It is found mostly on brackish wetlands, where it swims and wades while seeking small crustaceans.

A fortnight ago, there was a group of 30 to 40 banded stilts flying and swimming at Lake Wendouree.

These were the first banded stilts ever seen at the lake.

Banded stilts sometimes visit Lake Goldsmith when conditions are suitable, and they have been seen when Lakes Burrumbeet and Learmonth are shallow and drying.

There are a few other local reports.

Further afield, there was a recent report from Lake Wongan.

The recent Lake Wendouree birds probably spent much of the day on the central mud islands before moving elsewhere that night.

Flocks of yellow-tailed black-cockatoos are fairly common in the cooler months, but rarely are more than 200 seen.

Last week, we received a report of 300 of these large dark birds from Invermay.

Yellow-tailed black cockatoos in the Ballarat district are very much dependent on pine plantations for their pine-seed food.

Their natural food here was banksia and hakea seeds - which are both winged and rather similar in appearance to pine seeds.

These plants are uncommon now.

What is this growth on a wattle tree? Is it some sort of mistletoe starting to grow?

M.M., Mt Pleasant.

These growths are young seed pods developing on a wirilda wattle.

They will grow gradually for a few months until they mature and drop their seeds in summer.

Most wattles have their flowers in early spring, then their pods and seeds just a few months later.

But wirilda have their flowers slightly later than most - in October and November - after which their pods start to slowly form in readiness for summer more than twelve months later.

The wirilda produces seed each year, but that seed originates from flowers more than 12 months earlier, not from the latest batch of spring flowers (two months earlier).