Assessment, Conservation and Sustainable Use of Forest Biodiversity

Assessment and Monitoring
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AUDITING BIODIVERSITY AT THE LANDSCAPE SCALE – A CASE STUDY
FROM QUEENSLAND, AUSTRALIA
Paul Sattler 1 Andrea Leverington 2 Sally Egan 2 , Chris Mitchell 2 and Julia Playford 2*
1) Australia biodiversity assessment, National Land and Water Resources Audit, 68 Sanctuary Drive, Mt
Cotton, Qld. 4165
2) Research Coordination Unit, Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service PO Box 155 Brisbane Albert Street,
Qld. 4002
Keywords: biodiversity assessment, landscape conservation, threatening processes, conservation management
Extended Abstract
Australia has been divided into 85 bioregions within which a total of 350 subregions have been identified.
These subregions represent relatively homogenous geomorphic units and often reflect historical and current
land use patterns and associated threatening processes. Synopsis reports are being produced for each of these
subregions to record the condition and trend of a number of biodiversity elements at a landscape, ecosystem
and species scale. This is an ambitious project which will provide useful information for regional conservation
planning.
At the subregional landscape scale, known special values in terms of rarity, endemism, refugia and areas of
high diversity (ecosystem and species richness) are being recorded. Owing to the significant role of wetlands
and riparian zones for the maintenance of biodiversity, the condition, trend and key threatening processes are
being particularly assessed for wetlands and for riparian zones.
At the ecosystem level the first attempt is being made to comprehensively identify threatened regional
ecosystems across Australia and to relate this information to threatening processes at a subregional scale. At
the species level the trend in status and condition of listed threatened species is being assessed. Much of this
information is being collated by drawing upon the depth of information residing with regional ecologists and
resource rangers across Australia.
Four broad taxonomic groups are being assessed viz. birds, mammals, eucalypts and acacias. Part of this study
will consider the sub fossil record of regional mammal extinctions since European settlement. The studies will
then consider trends in species distribution in conjunction with landscape modification as well as identifying
centres of endemism and species richness. The condition, trend and threatening processes of each species will
also be assessed.
Management Options
The second part of this Audit Project is to assess management options for conservation. Conservation actions
under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia’s Biodiversity can be grouped under three
principal measures viz.
• reserve consolidation
• off-park conservation for species and ecosystem recovery
• integrated national resource management and threat abatement.
Accordingly, a comprehensive gap analysis is being undertaken of the National Reserve System including both
the formal IUCN Reserves 1-4 and the informal IUCN 5 & 6 Reserves and covenants. This analysis is being
undertaken in relation to the three CAR criteria: Comprehensiveness, Adequacy and Representativeness.
Comprehensiveness will assess the total percentage of all ecosystems sampled in reserves at a bioregional scale
whereas representativeness will assess the proportion of ecosystems sampled across their subregional
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