Biodiversity research and monitoring

Our Biodiversity Program conducts research on threatened or priority listed flora and fauna, and associated habitats, with the aim of improving management practices. Research can include assessing the distribution and habitat requirements of different species or communities, and determining the impact of harvesting operations on biodiversity.

Recommended management actions are available through the Threatened Species Adviser and Forest Botany Manual.

The Biodiversity Program also assesses whether management guidelines are being implemented, and how effective they are.

Our priority research areas

• development of biodiversity indicators for assessing ecologically sustainable forest management
• reserve management and predictive models of species, communities and successional processes for major forest types
• strategic information for private landowners to protect and maintain biodiversity
• the effects of plantation establishment and management on biodiversity conservation, both within the plantations and in adjacent natural ecosystems
• the effects of forest management on changes in biodiversity and other forest values
• research to underpin requirements for Recovery Plans and Threat Abatement Plans and the development of the means to assess the effectiveness of such conservation plans
• taxonomy, ecology and conservation management of poorly known species, whether common or rare.

Our current research projects

• Implementation of threatened fauna management prescriptions
• Wedge-tailed eagle nest monitoring project
• The distribution and conservation management of threatened invertebrates
• Monitoring the effects of harvesting on threatened stag beetles
• Grey goshawk, Accipter novaehollandaie
• Biodiversity Program research and monitoring: stream biodiversity
• Relating forest management to stream ecosystem condition in middle and
  lower catchment reaches in Tasmania
• Effect of harvesting on hydrobiid snails
• Recovery of headwater streams after logging
• Biodiversity Program research and monitoring: treeferns
• Treefern survival after intensive logging?
• Biodiversity Program research and monitoring: tree hollows
• Are hollow-bearing trees retained as prescribed?
• What is the mortality rate of retained hollow-bearing trees?
• Do retained hollow-bearing trees contribute to biodiversity within plantations?
• Mapping hollow availability
• The effectiveness of wildlife habitat strips

Full details of the progress is in our reports on monitoring the effectiveness of the biodiversity provisions of the Tasmanian Forest Practices Code (PDF 10.7 MB)

2022-23 Annual Report (PDF 18.5 MB)

2021-22 Annual Report (PDF 11.2 MB)

2020-21 Annual Report (PDF 5.0 MB)

2019–20 Annual Report (PDF 7.3 MB)

2018–19 Annual Report (PDF 6.0 MB)

2017-18 Annual Report (PDF 3.3 MB)

2016–17 Annual Report (PDF 6.4 MB)

2015–16 Annual Report (PDF 5.6 MB)

2014–15 Annual Report (PDF 5.0 MB)

2013–14 Annual Report (PDF 4.0 MB)