Sunshine Coast Natural Areas Management Contract

Catchment Services manages a major 5 Yr N.A. Contract for the Sunshine Coast Council. It incorporates over 180 Natural Bushland Reserves and 11 Retention Ponds and storm water biobasins that are funded partly by the Environmental levee received by Sunshine Coast ratepayers. The combined total area is over 1600 Ha; linking biodiversity corridors that enable fauna to move freely and flora seed to be spread naturally by wind, water and native fauna. Our role is one of managing and reducing weed populations that will improve the overall biodiversity and health of each of these reserves. Occasionally we speed up that process by doing minor revegetation in gap areas that were originally weed infested. We also carry out Bushland Operational Assessments on some of the major reserves to assess the resilience indicators of the forested areas; to see how they have improved due to our management.

Inclusive also within this contract is the weed and site preparation of 20 Community sites that are worked by Community Groups in revegetation projects. Daily reports of all these reserves are sent to the Council for their staff to monitor the health of each of these reserves.