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Playing the restoration long game

Published 28 Sep 2021 by Tina Parkhurst (Ecologist)

For the past three years, Eurardy Reserve on Nanda country in mid-west Western Australia has been the site of one of Bush Heritage’s most ambitious ecological restoration projects.

The 1 Million Trees Project involves planting 1 million trees, plants and shrubs across areas of the reserve degraded due to grazing and cropping during its time as a pastoral station.

As lead ecologist for this project, I’ve noticed how past scientific research into restoration efforts tends to focus on the most ‘visible’ species, namely mammals, birds and reptiles.

I became more and more interested in what was underneath. After all, if you want to understand the full impacts of restoration, it’s crucial to examine what’s happening in the soil and with the often overlooked fauna group: the invertebrates.

As degraded farmland is not an issue limited to Australia, I was also interested to find out what other land managers were doing across the planet and how their findings detailed how natural systems respond to restoration.

So, as part of my PhD with Murdoch University in Perth, I analysed 42 sites around the world for soil condition and invertebrate diversity. I compared restored degraded areas (previously used for agriculture, either grazing or cropping) with restored sites and intact, undisturbed sites.

My findings showed that soil in restored areas had:

  • Improved some nutrient concentrations
  • Reduced compaction
  • Improved porosity and water retention
  • Improved carbon content
Critically, although restored soil showed many improvements over soil from unrestored areas, it still wasn’t as healthy as the soil profile in the intact native vegetation.

I found no such trends for invertebrates. Sometimes invertebrate health was better on the degraded site because the habitat was better suited for them, for example: pastured areas can provide better food sources for beetles as well as denser grass which suits their habitat needs.

There are very few studies that have looked at how invertebrates respond to restoration in an agricultural setting, so we need more research into this topic. My PhD on York Gum woodlands examines this in greater detail, so stay tuned for another blog later this year.

Ultimately, restoration is a long game.

My research compared 10-year old sites with 50- to 100-year-old sites and showed that even after a century, restored ecosystems showed some improvements but they don’t achieve full recovery to conditions prior to clearing. Another study has suggested it might take up to 700 years to reach the health of areas with intact native vegetation.

It’s a sobering thought that emphasises how our efforts should focus on protecting the intact bushland we have left around Australia and the world, and how important it is to support organisations like Bush Heritage.

My research examined soil condition and invertebrate health at 42 sites around the world. My research examined soil condition and invertebrate health at 42 sites around the world.
Intact bushland at Eurardy on the left, and soon to be restored areas on the right. Photo by Katelyn Reynolds Intact bushland at Eurardy on the left, and soon to be restored areas on the right. Photo by Katelyn Reynolds
Ben, Liam and Tina Parkhurst at Eurardy. Ben, Liam and Tina Parkhurst at Eurardy.

Stories from Eurardy

BLOG 11/11/2022

Recycling provides new homes for native animals

Tenaya Duncan, Conservation and Wildlife Biology PhD student at Murdoch University, is using salvaged pallets, fence posts and corrugated iron in a unique way – as homes for native wildlife on our reserves!

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BLOG 12/10/2022

Southern Sandhill Frog calls recorded for the first time at Eurardy!

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BLOG 01/06/2022

Bat monitoring in revegetation

An extensive revegetation project has been underway for the three years at Eurardy Reserve (mid-west WA). We want to know if bats are present in this new planting. Our volunteer assignment was primarily to set everything up to start recording bat activity over the coming months (and maybe years).

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BLOG 06/01/2022

Restoration improves biodiversity & soil

Vegetation clearing for new agricultural land continues to cause environmental degradation, biodiversity loss and increased carbon emissions. But there are also large swathes of land no longer used for agriculture with potential to be remediated.

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BLOG 22/10/2021

Put the wet stuff on the red stuff 

Many of us know the old fire service adage. But, just what is the “red stuff”? It was this question and many more that led to the Midwest Bush Heritage Team undertaking bush fire training earlier this Spring.

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BLOG 28/09/2021

Playing the restoration long game

Scientific research into ecological restoration has traditionally focused on plants and animals. But what about what’s in the soil?

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BLOG 13/07/2021

Quoll patrol 🐾

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ichard McLellan is monitoring Sandalwood at Hamelin Reserve. Photo Shayne Thomson.

BUSHTRACKS 18/06/2021

The Great Sandalwood Transect

Across a 1500km arc from the Gibson Desert to Shark Bay, researcher Richard McLellan is uncovering the ecological and cultural value of sandalwood.

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BLOG 28/05/2021

Ecosystem restoration focus of $500,000 Volkswagen donation

The funding will be directed to our on-ground conservation work in three states.

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BLOG 10/05/2021

Chuditch cam!

A Western Quoll has been picked up on monitoring cameras at Eurardy Reserve on Nhanda country in WA for the very first time.

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BLOG 27/02/2020

Geez, that was hot

But I can’t really complain, because the intense heat that we receive in this part of the country was one of the main reasons that I was out on Eurardy on a hot day in the first place: I’m researching how some of the reserve’s plants and animals are responding to heat-waves, and the hotter and drier conditions that we’re experiencing through climate change.

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BLOG 31/10/2019

Birds and burrs at Eurardy Reserve

Volunteer Jan describes her time at Eurardy Reserve this spring. From tackling the double gees and cape weed, to hearing a juvenile Pied Butcher Bird learning its song, read on for a week in the life of a Bush Heritage Australia volunteer.

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BUSHTRACKS 17/09/2019

The one million tree project

As Bush Heritage ecologist Ben Parkhurst, his wife Tina Schroeder and their 10-month-old son Liam look on, the first of over 36,000 native seedlings are planted in the loamy, moist soil as part of the first phase of an ambitious project that will eventually see over 1350 hectares of cleared land on Eurardy restored.

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BLOG 01/07/2019

Swept away by Santalaceae

Ecologist Georgina Gould-Hardwick writes about her time spent submersing herself into Santalaceae science at our Eurardy and Charles Darwin Reserves.

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BLOG 25/03/2019

Mad for Malleefowl

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BLOG 07/09/2018

Eurardy orchids

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BLOG 16/08/2018

Frogs galore (and mice) at Eurardy

With small animal monitoring currently happening at Eurardy Reserve in cooler weather than previous years, we've seen a shift in the species we might normally expect to catch.

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BUSHTRACKS 27/03/2018

Eye in the sky

On Charles Darwin and Eurardy reserves in Western Australia, the innovative use of a remote sensing technology is marking the start of a new era in Malleefowl monitoring.

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BLOG 22/09/2017

Lots of life in the Eurardy surveys

Never one to let a chance go by (well, not if I can help it), I recently took a few days of annual leave from my 'day job' to volunteer for this year's Ecological Outcomes Monitoring surveys on Eurardy Reserve.

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BLOG 04/09/2017

National monitoring at Eurardy Reserve

When Australia's national environmental monitoring agency, the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN), expanded their WA AusPlots network, Bush Heritage ecologists seized the opportunity to include Eurardy Reserve.

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BLOG 19/02/2017

Restoring York gum woodlands

When my husband, Ben, and I decided to make the move to Eurardy Reserve in WA I was in the middle of searching for a research topic so I could start a PhD. I've landed on a project investigating the recovery of York Gum Woodlands in the mid-west.

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BLOG 22/07/2016

Restoration & revegetation planning

Eurardy Reserve is a special place, with some 700 plant species on the reserve, including a number of threatened, priority-listed and locally endemic species. However there are also cleared patches, a legacy of Eurardy's agricultural history, that have seen little to no natural regeneration for decades. This week we took the first steps towards restoring those patches back to the biodiverse areas they once were.

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BLOG 23/09/2015

Eurardy celebrates its 10th birthday

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BLOG 10/08/2015

Moving to the Western Rangelands

After moving to Eurardy Reserve to work as an ecologist on the Bush Heritage reserves in the Western Rangelands, my wife and I have been settling in and making it our new home. We've spent our time getting to know the landscape and its spectacular array of wildlife and plants. From the stunning Red-tailed Black Cockatoos that welcome you home as you drive through the gate to the gorgeous Splendid Fairy Wrens as you wander near the homestead.

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BLOG 08/12/2014

Burrowing bees

Spring has run its course in the mid-west of Western Australia. Flowers have bloomed and bees have played their role as pollinators. Find out more about some fascinating burrowing bees spotted at Eurardy and Charles Darwin Reserve.

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BLOG 16/06/2014

Trapdoor spiders

Last weekend at Eurardy Reserve (WA) ecologist Vanessa Westcott was working with the Citizen Science volunteers when they spotted the home of a trapdoor spider. The twigs and leaf litter radiating out from the burrow are fastened with web to the rim of the hole. They're used as 'trip lines' so insects walking by can be detected!

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