BURDEKIN DRY TROPICS NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PLAN 2016-2026
72 and animals are limited in contrast to the enormous costs of the pests. Collaboration and alignment of effort are key to ensuring that we maximize the value of those resources and support land managers to control pests onground. In the Burdekin Dry Tropics, a Regional Pest Management Group( RPMG), whose membership includes landcare and industry representatives, infrastructure managers, and local and state governments, oversees the strategic and collaborative delivery of the Regional Pest Management Strategy( 2014-2019). The group prioritises our region’ s pest plant and animal management efforts at a landscape level and across local government boundaries to maximize the effectiveness of limited resources( NQ Dry Tropics, 2014).
3. Fire regime
Appropriate fire management practices, over the short and long term, are an important contributor to biodiversity. The impact of fire regimes is complex and affects various vegetation communities and species differently, for example the Burdekin rangelands is believed to be well adapted to fire( Ash, 2004), however this is not the case for rainforests. Appropriate fire management will vary depending on factors such as desired management outcomes, climate, terrain, flora and fauna, and the scale and patchiness of the ecosystems. Establishing a fire regime that varies in intensity, season, frequency and scale is essential for managing biodiversity and vegetation species compositions. Inappropriate or lack of fire regimes have been implicated as a threat for many fauna and flora species( McCullough & Musso, 2004).
The absence of an appropriate fire regime can result in:
• a change in woodland structure( thickening);
• loss of riparian vegetation;
• loss of rare fauna and flora species;
• an increase in woody weeds; and
• poor land condition.
Thickening in particular is a widespread phenomenon on uncleared native vegetation where there is also a reduced frequency of fires. The lack of fire changes the structure of open woodlands by allowing saplings to grow out of the firesensitive phase( McCullough & Musso,
2004). This also causes a loss or change in ground layer plant species as the tree canopy becomes denser.
4. Active land use
Overgrazing has been noted as one of the main threats to biodiversity in the rangelands( Department of Environment and Resource Management, 2010). More specific impacts on biodiversity from overgrazing include loss of priority plants, trampled habitat, reduced ground cover, decline of soil structure, erosion of watercourses, eutrophication, competition of water needs with native animals and plants, decreased composition and diversity of native plants species, and reduced diversity and abundance of soil crust organisms caused by hoof damage( McCullough & Musso, 2004)( Department of Environment and Resource Management, 2010).
Other sections of the NRM plan identify that managing stock rates within the carrying capacity of the land-type helps to maintain land condition, improves water infiltration and quality, and maintains or improves biodiversity. Sustainable grazing land management has also been identified to be financially worthwhile in the longterm( McIvor, 2012).
5. Marine debris
Marine debris can have a detrimental impact on marine wildlife such as seabirds and turtles. There is a gap in our knowledge about the toxic impacts, especially in our rivers and estuarine environments, where trapped plastic debris will continue to leach into those environments, triggering long-term impacts.
The Australian Marine Debris Initiative is an on-ground network of volunteers, communities, organisations and agencies around the country monitoring the impacts of marine debris along the coastlines. In the Burdekin catchment area local volunteers have removed one and a half tonnes of debris during 14 clean up events in 2015 alone, with about 75 per
Managing weeds across the region
Delta Arrowhead( Sagittaria platyphylla), a nationally-significant aquatic weed species has been identified in Townsville. If this weed spreads it will potentially become a major problem for the cane industry and threaten significant nationally and internationally-recognised natural coastal wetlands in the Lower Burdekin.
NQ Dry Tropics has brought together Townsville City Council, Burdekin Shire Council, Biosecurity Queensland and Coastal Dry Tropics Landcare to collaborate to contain this weed and reduce the risk of it spreading to other areas in the Burdekin Dry Tropics region where it would be exponentially more difficult and expensive to control.
BIODIVERSITY