Plan to Protect Environmental Assets from Lantana - Weeds Australia

Plan to Protect Environmental Assets from Lantana
introduction in the 1840s (Swarbrick et al. 1998), lantana has become highly invasive in both
agricultural and natural ecosystems, to the point that it is now ranked as one of the 20 worst
weeds in Australia (see Thorp and Lynch 2000).
Lantana has spread extensively along the east coast of Australia, with whole ecosystems and
many species now threatened (Turner et al. 2008a, Turner and Downey in press) . Despite
extensive efforts at control, lantana remains a major weed (ARMCANZ et al. 2001). Lantana
thrives in warm, high-rainfall environments, where it grows along forest edges, penetrates
disturbed rainforest and invades open eucalypt woodlands, tree plantations and pastures
(ARMCANZ et al. 2001). In N SW in 1919, 18 municipalities and 22 shires had proclaimed
lantana as noxious (Swarbrick 1986). Lantana now covers more than 4 million hectares of
Australia, from Eden in southern NSW to north of Cooktown on Cape York, QLD. Outlying
infestations also occur on the Torres Strait Islands, Lord Howe Island, Norfolk Island, and
Cape York, and in central western QLD, in the Northern Territory, in Western Australia and
(until recent removal) near Orbost in Victoria and near Adelaide in South Australia (Swarbrick
1986, QLD NRM & E 2004, Kym Johnson pers comm.). The ecology and biology of lantana
has recently been reviewed by Stock et al. (2009) and Johnson (2007) and the full distribution
of lantana is currently being mapped using remote sensing (Stewart et al. 2008).
1.7 Managing the threat
There are insufficient resources to fully implement lantana control measures at all sites across
lantana’s range. Therefore, sites within this Plan have been ranked on a nationally consistent
basis to ensure that decisions about funding for control activities maximise the conservation
benefits. This methodology allows for the protection and expansion of existing populations of
threatened species and ecological communities, and has been guided by:
the degree of threat that lantanaposes to environmental assets (native species and
ecological communities)
the number of high-priority environmental assets likely to benefit from control in a
locality
the potential of the environmental asset to recover at the site
the importance of the site to the environmental asset’s existence
the effectiveness of lantana control in each particular area.
Maintaining areas that are presently free of lantana or removing isolated infestations, including
those within other states, will also be beneficial, as biodiversity in these areas will be protected
from lantana invasions. Given this, this Plan is supported by the Lantana Weeds of National
Significance (WoNS) Program, which c oordinates management of isolated infestations outside
core infestations, including containment zones.
This document outlines the:
threats lantana poses to environmental assets and their conservation priority(Chapter
2), especially those plant and animal species and ecological communities identified to
be at risk from invasion, as well as the native species that benefit from such invasions
site selection process of high-priority sites for the control of lantana, which will offer the
greatest benefit to high- priority assets (Chapter3 )
objectives and actions to abate, ameliorate or eliminate the threat of lantana to highpriority
assets across Australia, along with performance indicators for each
(Chapter 4)
implementation process for the Plan (Chapter 5), including Indigenous consultation;
plans for site-specific management (see Figure 1.1); maintaining other areas that are
presently free of lantana; and the economic and social implications of this Plan,
monitoring required to assess the effectiveness of control programs at high- priority
control sites, especially with respect to protecting assets (Chapter 6)
a proforma for developing site-specific management plans (Appendix 1)
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