Improved vegetation planning for rural landscapes

Product Information

This project uses Landscape Function Analysis to evaluate the performance of two existing approaches to vegetation planning: the Focal Species Approach and Thresholds Approach.

The Focal Species Approach is being applied in parts of Western Australia, New South Wales, and the Australian Capital Territory, and is used to identify the minimum amount of habitat required to support local populations of all resident fauna species.

The Thresholds Approach is most relevant to grazed landscapes, especially eucalypt-dominated grassy woodlands. It considers a wide range of issues, and identifies probable upper limits (thresholds) for land use(s) that maintain biodiversity and ecosystem services.

The adequacy of these two existing approaches to vegetation planning, is being examined in terms of landscape functioning. The project is using Landscape Function Analysis (LFA) to analyse water and nutrient movement in the landscape and potential for loss of these resources from the landscape via watercourses. Using LFA, the project assesses the health of landscapes in terms of the maintenance of soil health, surface water quality and farm productivity.

Importantly, the project tests how well the "Focal Species" and the "Thresholds" approaches protect the critical landscape functions identified by LFA. Careful planning and management of rural landscapes are needed if we are to ensure biodiversity and ecosystem services are maintained.

Native vegetation, and the animals that live in it, represent much of the biodiversity in rural areas and provide key ecosystem functions (such as preventing soil erosion, nutrient losses into waterways, and rising saline groundwater). In some areas, native vegetation also provides the basic resource for productive enterprises (e.g. native pastures for grazing and flowers for honey). The further development of these approaches assists in planning land use and investment that will promote sustainability of landscapes and in turn the rural economies they support.