2023-03-07 - P&E Agenda - Item 4 - Attachment 1 - Environmental Services - Threatened Fauna Recovery Road Map

4.        Findings from Desktop Review
Noosa Shire is located within the South-East Queensland Bioregion, an area of exceptionally high biodiversity,
lying in the zone where tropical and temperate land zones overlap. This provides for a set of conditions that
support a great variety of plants and animals. Noosa has a large variety of all three levels of biodiversity, at the
genetic, species and ecosystem level. These are supported by a wide range of ecosystem types, including key
habitat areas such as rainforests, beaches, woodlands, wetlands, lakes, rivers, forests, mountains and marine
areas.


4.1       Key habitats and broad vegetation groups
From the evaluation of supporting information, seven (7) key habitat types were identified across the Noosa LGA
(see Table 2 below). Please note that for the purpose of this Road Map Heaths and other coastal communities
have been combined with mangroves and saltmarsh (due to habitat distribution of threatened species). Table 2
breaks down the key habitat types into twenty-seven (27) broad vegetation groups (BVGs) (comprised of sixty-
four (64) regional ecosystems).

Table 2: Key habitat breakdown for Noosa LGA
                                                                                           Proportional Spread of
                                                           Number of Different BVGs
                   Key Habitat Types                                                            the 27 BVGs
                                                           (within key habitat types)
                                                                                            (across key habitats)
 Rainforests and scrubs                                                  5                           19%
 Eucalypt forests and woodlands combined with
                                                                        13                           48%
 Melaleuca woodlands
 Ecotones and combined habitats                                      Variable                   Not definable
 Freshwater waterways, wetlands and riparian zones                      3                           11%
 Heaths and other coastal communities                                    4                           15%
 Saltmarsh and mangroves                                                2                             7%
 Coastal and Marine                                                    N/A                            N/A

Actions Required under the Road Map
To achieve an integrated approach, key threatened species nominated for management priorities should
proportionally represent each of the key habitat types identified above, see Section 6.3 - Representation of key
habitats (BVGs) across the Noosa Nine.


4.2       Threatened ecological communities
The Noosa Shire contains four (4) threatened ecological communities that are (or are to be shortly) recognised
and protected under Commonwealth legislation (EPBC Act 1999);
    • Critically Endangered Lowland Rainforest of Subtropical Australia (lowland rainforest)
    • Vulnerable Subtropical and Temperate Salt Marsh (saltmarsh)
    • Endangered Coastal Swamp Oak (Casuarina glauca) Forest
    • Coastal Swamp Sclerophyll Forests (conservation advice soon to be listed)