Mackay’s endangered ecologies need landholders help
A new interactive map shows the Mackay areas with critically endangered environments at ‘risk of extinction’. But small things can help preserve them for future generations.
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Mackay residents may see nothing particularly special about their backyard or local beach but travellers and environmentalists are finding something very unique.
The Mackay region is home to more than 40 per cent of Australia’s total broad leaf tea-tree, and 15 per cent of the nation’s ‘beach scrub’, known as eco-communities.
Reef Catchment coast and biodiversity officer Cass Hayward said because of the prominence of the eco-communities in the region, many Mackay residents did not realise they were “critically endangered”.
Both eco-communities have been recorded in the Australian government’s list of Threatened Ecological Communities, meaning they have been classified as “at risk of extinction”.
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Reef Catchments launched a platform to work with Mackay landholders who have one of the eco-communities on their property.
Ms Hayward said the organisation would visit the property of landholders volunteering to help, and discuss what the was the resident’s long-term vision for the land.
“The plan is we then evaluate what measures we can take to preserve that piece of land and to partner with the landholder,” she said.
Landholders who volunteer to work with the organisation may receive funding for weed control, fencing and help in fire management and revegetation.
Residents can check out what whether they have these ecologies on their property easily by viewing Reef Catchment’s interactive map here.
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Originally published as Mackay’s endangered ecologies need landholders help
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