Day: September 6, 2016

BENCHMARKS are being set to monitor the number and variety of animals living in Western Port’s seagrass beds. Known as the bay’s marine nurseries, a series of night trawls of the seagrass beds in January captured 14,073 animals from five species. The most common animals were crustacea – which includes crabs, lobsters, crayfish, shrimp, krill, woodlice and barnacles – and fish. A team of researchers from the Western Port Seagrass Partnership will repeat the trawl to compare animal numbers and varieties in summer and spring. Marine ecologist Dr Hugh Kirkman said January’s trawl for juvenile fish and macroinvertebrates was the…

HMAS Cerberus personnel donated blood at the Frankston Donor Centre last week as part of the Defence Blood Challenge. They included Commanding Officer Captain Stephen Bowater, Executive Officer Commander Melanie Verho, Leading Seaman Jordan Manie and Able Seaman Debbie Haby. They were part of an annual event, now in its eighth year, which challenges Navy, Army, Air Force and Defence staff to make the most blood donations from September to December. Last year, Defence Force personnel gave more than 6400 blood donations – enough to potentially save 19,200 lives. This year, they are hoping to donate enough to save the…

By Jarrod Potter FIRE may have taken their basketball home in May, but 126 days later the Western Port Steelers have brought victory back to Somerville. Despite the loss of the Somerville Recreation and Community Centre, the Steelers will remember 2016 as the year they broke through to win the Big V Division 2 Men’s championship victory on Sunday. The Steelers had to do it the hard way – at their second home with Southern Peninsula Basketball Association and the Hillview Stadium – after conceding a 64-59 loss to Coburg in the first match of the series. Western Port fought…