Please be aware that a planned cultural burn will be conducted at T-Section grassland on Wednesday 10th or Thursday 11th May (pending weather conditions). During this time there will be no access to T-Section lagoon to ensure birdwatcher safety.

The burn will be undertaken by the Wadawurrung, traditional owners of the Western Treatment Plant, with the Country Fire Authority (CFA).

'Cultural burning' practices were developed by Aboriginal people over thousands of years to enhance the health of the land and its people. It involves cool burning (or prevention of burning) for the health of particular plants and animals, and may include patch burning to create different fire intervals across the landscape, or be used for fuel and hazard reduction.

The Birdwatching team would like to thank you all for your patience throughout the recent key swap to merge general and special routes of the Western Treatment Plant Birdwatching site.

We will be removing the general access maroon/brown key locks on Wednesday 31^st May. This means that the maroon/brown keys will no longer open any birdwatching site gates from this date onwards.

All gates, including gate 8, will require the lilac/light purple key.

• If you are an approved birdwatcher (valid birdwatching access) and have not received your new lilac/light purple key please contact us at [email protected] to arrange a key replacement.
• If you have a maroon/brown key but your birdwatching access has expired and you would like to continue to visit the site, please click on this link and apply online to renew your birdwatching access. Once your application is received we will renew your birdwatching access for a further 2 years and send out a replacement key.
• If you have a lilac/light purple key but your birdwatching access has expired and you would like to continue to visit the site, please click on this link and apply online to renew your birdwatching access.

Please be mindful that the Western Treatment Plant is an operational site. The area beyond Gate 8 is adjacent to our operational area and we kindly ask all birdwatchers & their guests to respect this boundary and pay special attention to any operational activities that are occurring here.

While we make every effort to inform birdwatchers of limited access, from time to time we will need to close off smaller areas for operational and safety purposes. Please obey barriers and signs when you come across them.

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If you have any queries, please don't hesitate to contact us via email [email protected] or telephone 131 722.

Go to the Birdwatching at Western Treatment Plant page