Chris Dobney’s article in Echonetdaily of 25 May 2015 was headed Kings Forest gets green light to clear koala habitat. Unfortunately, they have also got the green light to clear the vulnerable Wallum Sedge Frog (WSF) habitat.
Under the misnomer heading of ‘Protecting WSF populations’, the approval document approves the destruction of most of the existing WSF habitat.
‘Existing habitat that will be removed for development’ is comprised of 44 ha of habitat. ‘Existing WSF habitat that will remain as habitat after development’ amounts to an additional 33.63 ha. A comparison of this map with the Kings Forest vegetation map reveals that a significant amount of this land (roughly one-third of the total) is on potential acid sulfate soil, which in its resting state is too basic (pH 6 to 7) for reproduction of WSF. Essential breeding habitat is <pH6.0. So, some of the habitat claimed to be saved from development may not be suitable for WSFs.
Areas indicated as ‘created WSF habitat’ (45.09 ha) are also problematic. The largest chunk (about three-quarters) is to be created on acid sulfate soil. The next largest area is to be created on land mapped as ‘exotic pine plantation’, which is not likely to have soils sufficiently acidic for WSF to thrive and multiply. The proportion of the proposed ‘created WSF habitat’ that might be suitable for WSF habitat creation appears to be small.
The good news is that a WSF Management Plan is now required. And the created WSF habitat must be ‘substantially established’ prior to the commencement of bulk earthworks. In addition, pre-clearance surveys and relocation of WSFs must be undertaken within one day of commencement of bulk earthworks at each stage. Many reporting obligations are described.
On the other hand, the commencement of construction can apparently precede relocation of WSFs. Commencement of construction is defined as clearing of vegetation, erection of onsite temporary structures and use of heavy equipment for the purpose of breaking the ground for bulk earthworks, buildings or infrastructure preceding bulk earthworks. In other words, the WSFs may already be dead by the time bulk earthworks come along.
Created WSF habitat (as compensatory ponds) did not work for the Tugun by-pass. During a couple of years of monitoring, no WSFs had been recorded in the ponds. The pH had usually been too high for them. Evidence should be obtained that relocation of WSFs into compensatory habitat actually works, before it is attempted for the Kings Forest WSFs.
Frog underpasses and exclusion fences to protect WSFs from road kill have not been considered. An offset area is required in case the plan fails, but an offset area will not save the WSFs of Kings Forest.
All in all, the EPBC approval document does not hold out much hope for the WSFs of Kings Forest.
References: Kings Forest vegetation and acid sulfate soil maps are in earlier documentation. Tugun Bypass Management Plan Five Year Review, tugunbypassfrogmgtplan.pdf from tmr.qld.gov.au. NSW DPI, Myths Associated with Pines. Meyer, E., J.M. Hero, L. Shoo & B. Lewis (2006). National recovery plan for the wallum sedgefrog and other wallum-dependent frog species. Qld Gov’t, Identifying acid sulfate soils https://www.qld.gov.au/environment/land/soil/acid-sulfate/identified/ .
Joan Vickers, Toowoomba, Qld
All levels of government are idiots masquerading as ‘experts’ making critical environmental decisions. They should all be sacked and replaced with people who care and are knowledgeable about species such as Joan Vickers who wrote this article.
This current state of affairs will ensure complete annihilation of all our native animals in time. Australia already has the world’s worst record for mammal extinctions and this is precisely the reason why.
On the other hand, maybe the government ‘experts’ already know what Joan is saying but defer because they have been bought out by big development.
Photo credit: wallum sedge frog Litoria olongburensis, Photo © Katrin Lowe, Griffith School of Environment, Griffith University, http://www.wildlife.org.au/projects/researchgrants/wallumsedgefrog.html
The EPBC office informed me this morning that the translocation of frogs was to be done prior to earthworks rather than prior to commencement of construction, as stated in the approval, in order to leave open the possibility to translocate WSFs and their habitat together. Presumably the habitat will be surveyed for WSFs prior to removal. So, the statement in my comments above that the WSFs could be dead prior to earthworks is not necessarily the case. Nonetheless, we need to ensure once the Frog Management Plan is produced that their method for translocation of WSFs actually works, ie results in reproducing WSF populations, prior to commencing construction. Also, they did not define or map critical habitat (habitat where the WSFs are currently reproducing in Kings Forest).This is a problem because all of the critical habitat may be destroyed while removing 44 ha of WSF habitat, leaving behind only non-critical habitat. These matters are to be clarified in the Statement of Reasons for the Kings Forest approval, to be published in a couple of weeks. Watch this space – http://www.environment.gov.au/cgi-bin/epbc/epbc_ap.pl?name=current_referral_detail&proposal_id=6328 .