2021-02-09 P&E Agenda - Item 6 - Attachment 1 - Draft Noosa Bushland Reserve Strategic Plan 2021-2026

The Bushland Care groups have a
long history of successfully obtaining
external funding and committing to
follow-up maintenance to a number of
sites. Council will continue to support
the community groups preferably
guided by, but sitting independently of,
the prioritisation and management
recommendations within this Plan.

Resources will be allocated to
improving the capacity of the Bushland
Care Groups to undertake works to
best practice standards in consultation
with the local community and to aid in
the attraction of external funding. This
may include training workshops, grant    Bushland Care Groups can be supported in a variety of ways and can
writing support and assistance, and on- enable valuable local community engagement
ground materials such as signage and
flyers to local residents.



8.4     Operational Activities
8.4.1       Reactionary Issues – Customer Requests
The role of local government is to deliver services to its community. One of these services is to
respond to requests from residents. In the context of managing bushland reserves these requests
may relate to concerns over fire risk, trees dropping limbs, vegetation reducing amenity, and
wildlife including pest animal species. Council manages many of these requests independently of
the specified management programs, which focus on ecological restoration.


8.4.2       Invasive species management.
For reserves allocated the ‘Protect’ and ‘Enhance’ Management Category, the desired medium-
term objective is to eradicate all invasive weed species from the reserves.

Weed control activities should be undertaken at the most effective times based on the target weed
species life cycle with the intent to reduce weed seed production and exhaust the reserves of weed
seeds in the soil.

Weed such as lantana that have some habitat values for native animals should be removed
gradually (for example lantana thickets can provide suitable habitat for Black-breasted Buttonquail
(Turnix melanogaster). The aim is to remove weeds at the rate of recovery of native species to
avoid disruption to faunal habitat. Areas of exotic grasses such as setaria (Setaria sphacelata) may
provide habitat for granivorous bird species such as finches so should not necessarily be slashed
to “tidy up” the site.

For reserves within the ‘Monitor’ category, the intent is to monitor priority invasive species identified
by the Noosa Biosecurity Plan or the ‘transformer’ weeds list and target if significant impacts are
occurring.




Noosa Bushland Reserves Strategic Plan 2021 – 2026                                                 Page 41