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Cooloola nat park burnt out?

To: "John Hammond" <>, <>
Subject: Cooloola nat park burnt out?
From: "Ross Macfarlane" <>
Date: Thu, 3 Dec 2009 17:48:51 +1100
It's a good point, & the mallee emu-wren is a case in point. After a fire in Ngarkat CP in SA some years ago, the population disappeared from that area, leaving the bird with just one stronghold, in Murray-Sunset and Hattah-Kulkyne NPs straddling the Calder Highway. Sarah Brown's work has shown that while the local population is healthy (in the 10s of thousands from memory), they are sedentary and have poor dispersal; in other words once they're lost from an area it's very hard for them to recolonise it.

Gone from Ngarkat. Gone from Annuello FFR. Gone from all other known previous habitats.

One big fire in the in Murray-Sunset / Hattah triodia country, & the species could be extinct.

And it's not the only species in that boat; not by a long chalk...

Ross Macfarlane




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