Spring 2024 – National Parks Association of NSW

Wombats have an important role in helping our forest wildlife recover from megafires

Posted by NPA NSWon August 27, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Dr Jonathon Howard, NPA Executive

Every ecosystem has certain species that are critical to the survival of the other species. They are sometime labelled ‘keystone species’. New research is showing wombats may play an increasingly important role in the survival of other species as our environment becomes more fire prone.

Although New South Wales is home to a spectacular variety of plants, animals, and ecosystems, our biodiversity faces a number of pressures, including those that arise from climate change.

The NSW biodiversity outlook report 2024 has just been released

Posted by NPA NSWon August 27, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Dr Jonathon Howard, NPA Executive

New South Wales is home to an amazing array of plants, animals and other living things. Environment and Heritage NSW released its NSW biodiversity outlook report 2024.

In 2020, the first outlook report covered 10 indicators, with supporting published methods and available data. This 2024 outlook report updates the 2020 indicators and introduces new indicators. Many indicators are also reported at a bioregion scale. The report, based on findings across 13 indicators, is unique in its scale and provides crucial information that can help inform our response to the biodiversity crisis.

Thinking big, the next phase in campaigning for our Southern Forests

Posted by NPA NSWon August 27, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Gary Dunnett, CEO and Kate Carroll, Conservation Projects Officer

Some of NPA’s deepest roots lie in the forests that cloak the landscapes between the Great Dividing Range and the rugged southern coasts. These are contested regions whose economy relies upon nature-based tourism, while allowing the very worst of industrial clear-felling and woodchipping.

NPA has been calling for a shift from exploitation to protection of the southeast forests for decades. The long history of the forest campaigns is documented in David Gallan’s wonderful 2016 documentary ‘Understorey’.

Those campaigns had significant successes, including the creation of parks such as Southeast Forest National Park. The parks that were established as part of the original Eden and Southern Forest Regional Forest Agreement (RFA) negotiations were a great beginning, but are not enough to truly secure the biodiversity values of the forests.

What are OECMS?

Posted by NPA NSWon August 26, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Dr Jonathon Howard, NPA Executive

In 2022 a new global biological diversity policy framework was adopted by 188 representative nations, including Australia. Underpinned by scientific research, the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) promotes the conservation of at least 30% of global terrestrial and marine areas by 2030 as a stepping stone toward 50% percent by 2050.

Photographing the Annual Humpback Migration

Posted by NPA NSWon August 26, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Gary Dunnett, CEO NPA NSW

I started working at Kamay Botany Bay National Park in the late 1990’s, just as the annual migration of Humpback Whales was becoming one of the highlights of the Sydney calendar. My kids grew up enduring winter mornings spotting whales and each year I’d head out to get a bit of salt crust on the telephoto lens. A quarter century later, the Humpback migration is very much entrenched as part of my year.

Shark nets: a false sense of security

Posted by NPA NSWon August 26, 2024August 26, 2024in Spring 2024Leave a comment

Loéva Martin-Podevin, PhD candidate Macquarie University, Supervisors: Professor Culum Brown and Jane Williamson

Sharks in Australia 

Australia is home to 180 shark species, representing almost half of all shark species worldwide. Most of the country’s human population is distributed along the coast, increasing the possibility of human-shark interactions. Recently, these interactions have been on the rise worldwide¹ attributed to the increase in coastal population density and the growing number of people participating in water activities (surfing, diving, swimming). Human-shark interactions are defined as any contact between a human and a shark, ranging from a shark swimming close to a human to a shark bite related death. These interactions can be divided into provoked or unprovoked. A provoked incident occurs when a human actively tries to engage with a shark. For example, when a diver approaches too close or tries to touch the shark and gets bitten. The probability of getting killed by a shark in Australia is very low: one in 8 million, the same as being killed by a kangaroo (The Nature Conservancy Australia). In 2023, 15 unprovoked shark incidents were reported in Australia, (including one in New South Wales (NSW)) which resulted in four fatalities. Shark bites most likely occur because sharks mistake humans for prey. But they soon realise their mistake and move on. Humans are not on their menu. Three species of sharks are mostly responsible for these incidents: The White Shark, the Bull Shark and the Tiger Shark. These species are the targets of shark management methods on Australia’s East Coast.  