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Planting is the plan for our domant quarries

21 Mar 22

Sustainability

Published in our 2021 Annual Review

Returning quarry sites to their natural beauty is all part of our commitment to caring for the environment. Stuart and his team work with Nature Glenelg Trust to replant the quarries with trees propagated from areas local to each quarry.

A quarry in the Green Triangle, surrounded by newly planted forest

Quarries and Roading in the Green Triangle

“When it comes to building roads, the major cost is transporting the quarried material to the plantations so most of our quarries are within 10km of where they’re needed,” says Stuart Adam, Roading Forester for our Green Triangle Forests.

Stuart’s job is to keep all of the elements of our roading operations on the right track.

“Roading is integral to providing year-round transport. We deliver 40,000 tonnes of logs a week over the roads, and we maintain more than 2,400km of roads across the Green Triangle,” he says.

It stands to reason then that our quarries are essential infrastructure for keeping our forestry operations rolling.

OneFortyOne has 42 quarries in the Green Triangle, 28 of which are active. Stuart explains, “The quarries are important for meeting our operational needs. The majority are used regularly and others are only used when we’re building roads close by.”

Reintegrating and Rehabilitating Quarry Sites

But what happens to the quarries when they’re not needed? There’s no denying they can be a jarring presence in the landscape and put to better use, so OneFortyOne is working to reintegrate quarry sites with their natural environment after plantations around them are clear felled.

Quarry rehabilitation

“We’ve been doing some rehabilitation work at our quarry sites over the past couple of years, which involves reinstating the topsoil and working with NGT to revegetate with native plants,” says Stuart.

“When you quarry you strip the topsoil, then there’s ‘over burden’ (a layer of rock) and then pure rock.

We remove and place the overburden and topsoil separately and when the quarry is exhausted we reinstate both to about half a metre thick.”

Stuart and his team work with Nature Glenelg Trust to replant the quarries with trees propagated from areas local to each quarry. Using indigenous trees supports the local ecosystems and improves the survival rates of the seedlings.

Rehabilitated quarries lush with new vegetation may be hard to spot, but they are not forgotten.

Drone technology is enabling OneFortyOne to conduct 3D modelling of the quarries to capture activity in the area over time.

That information goes into our GIS system and ensures we have an accurate picture of where we have dug previously and what we might find there if we revisit the site for materials in the future.


OneFortyOne acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of Country throughout Australia and their deep connections to land, water, and community. We pay our respect to Elders past and present and extend that respect to all First Nations people today.

In Aotearoa New Zealand, Māori communities have a strong spiritual connection between people and the land – the wellbeing of one sustains the wellbeing of the other. We strive to build meaningful relationships with iwi as tangata whenua (people of the land/region), to be responsible intergenerational kaitiaki (stewards/guardians) of the land where our forests grow.