Tree fern gully at Liffey
River Reserve.
Olearia sp.
Fencing with the Greencorp team at Drys Bluff.
Pulling foxgloves at Liffey
River Reserve.
Every five years, the management plans of Bush Heritage reserves are reviewed and overhauled. The outcomes of the past management actions provide feed back into the review process and guide future management and new initiatives in the schedule of works.
The management plans for Drys Bluff and Liffey River Reserves, located close together in northern Tasmania, have recently undergone this process. Through the review we looked at each management action, ticked some off the list as complete and noted progress made on others. However, it is interesting to reflect on two management actions that haven't been attempted. One called for the opportunistic removal of kookaburra nests and the other for the removal of European wasps and their nests. Both of these species are introduced to Tasmania and appear to have a negative impact on the local reptiles and other insects, respectively.
The reasons that I haven't attempted these seemingly worthwhile jobs are two fold. Firstly, the opportunity hasn't arisen. Secondly, I intuitively felt that the occasional destruction of an individual nest would not deliver a worthwhile conservation benefit for the effort required.
Dr Steven Mellick from Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service agreed that opportunistic removal of European wasp nests would not deliver a long-term solution. His recent studies found that wasps recolonise an area in the season following removal and only a constant effort across the landscape, placing baited traps in 100m grids, would permanently remove them. If wasps cannot be realistically controlled it is interesting to reflect on what might be an acceptable level of management.
Bush Heritage reserves are either actual or conceptual islands in the matrix of the wider landscape and are subject to all kinds of pressures from outside the boundaries. Deciding how best to protect the values of the reserves from external pressures is difficult. Should we undertake extensive feral baiting, trapping or hunting programs? Should we erect feral animal proof fencing? Should we remove all the weeds or just some? How much of it can we afford? If we start a program, how will we continue it for the long term? Do we have to accept that reserves may never be 'pristine'?
To avoid lengthy navel gazing we have decided to adopt a practical approach - doing what we can with the limited resources. This means working to alleviate the threats to those ecosystems or species with the highest conservation values and stretching the tight budget as far as it will go with the help of volunteers.
A recent example of this has been the use of Greencorp teams in the two Tasmanian reserves. Once again braving the rain, they have done great work against the foxgloves in the rainforest valleys of both Drys Bluff and Liffey River Reserves. For a week, a team of Bush Heritage friends and supporters volunteered alongside the Greencorp teams, giving specialist advice, assisting with other weed control and documenting the progress with photos. The wasps and kookaburras remain.
