New hope for Australia's threatened eco-systems
The entire east coast of Australia is set to become a 'terrestrial version of The Great Barrier Reef' in an attempt to protect some of the countries most threatened wildlife. The 1740 mile strip of land, which will run from the southern state of Victoria right up to the Northern territory in Queensland, will provide a valuable haven for threatened plants and animals, including the gang gang cockatoo (pictured here), the golden sun moth and the hooded robin.
Owen Whittaker from Bush Heritage, a non-profit making organisation which buys land for conservation with help from the government, said "If we go through even a 3C temperature increase in the next 50 to 100 years that is going to cause a big change in the way plants grow and in the way animals need to move through the landscape to survive. We need to give the rarest animals that are clinging on [to life] by their tails the space to rearrange themselves as the weather changes."
A large chunk of the money required to purchase the land has come from Dr Peter Barrer, a UK scientist who lived in New South Wales, and who spent a large part of his time supporting and carrying out conservation work in the area.
One of the areas included in the project is the Scottsdale reserve, a 3000 acre property south of Canberra, which is host to an impressive array of wildlife habitats such as dry eucalyptus woodlands, swamps and bogs. Private landowners in the area will be encouraged to sign up to voluntary conservation agreements, and farmers will receive financial incentives to find less harmful farming techniques.
[via The Guardian]
