Mill: For the birds

Donald Knowler Birds Tasmania’s submission to the RPDC on the pulp mill

Tasmania’s ornithologists have warned that the proposed pulp mill will exacerbate the crisis facing many of the state’s bird species. And they say the unprecedented scale of forestry operations in the state is having a devastating impact on forest birds and other wildlife.

BURIED amid the hundreds of thousands of words making up the submissions for and against the proposed pulp mill in the state’s north is a plea for the humble twig and leaf.

Birds Tasmania has put a case for not just the twig and leaf, but the tree hollow, the rotting log and all the other ingredients that make up the fecund environment of the forest.

The organisation in its submission to the Resource Planning and Development Commission opposing the pulp mill development says that the industrial forestry operations that would fuel the mill are detrimental to Tasmania’s wildlife.

Part of the submission is given over to the role that shed limbs and branches, part of what is termed “course woody debris”, plays in the forest ecology.

The rotting vegetation around trees and the mulch formed by fallen leaves creates a home for invertibrates, which in turn provide food for birds, reptiles and animals.

“With large-scale clearfell, burn and conversion to plantations, and the notion that forest residue is waste, when in fact it is also vitally important to the health of the ecosystem, it is likely that many elements of biological diversity are decreasing,” says Sarah Lloyd, of Birds Tasmania’s conservation committee.

She says that there is a growing recognition worldwide that the loss of course woody debris from forests and woodlands is a major threat to the conservation of biological diveristy.

In Europe, a third of forest dwelling species rely on logs, branches and dying trees for their survival. Forests with old and dead trees are often much healthier and more resistant to diseases, pests and climate change than young forests.

In Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland the loss of course woody debris and the removal of fallen branches and litter in a general “tidying up” had recently been listed as a potentional threat to wildlife.

Tasmania’s ornithologists have warned that the proposed pulp mill will exacerbate the crisis facing many of the state’s bird species.

And they say the unprecedented scale of forestry operations in the state is having a devastating impact on forest birds and other wildlife.

If the pulp mill get the go-ahead it will put Tasmania’s forest species under even greater pressure.

In its submission, Birds Tasmania says large areas of forest are being cleared and fragmented for forestry, agriculture and housing development.

Some species are found only in Tasmania

And the isolated and fragmented bush that remains is being further degraded through the clearing and burning of understorey.

“Many birds cannot exist in these degraded areas, as they face an increased risk of predation, competition for resources, and only the most mobile species are able to recolonise sites where local extinctions have occurred.”

The submission says the north-east forests which could make way for plantations to serve the pulp mill represent many different vegetation communities and thus support a diversity of bird species.

Some of these species are found only in Tasmania, like the yellow-throated, strong-billed and black-headed honeyeaters, and the dusky robin.

There are a number of rare and threatened bird species that have breeding or foraging habitat in the north-east, including the wedge-tailed eagle, grey goshawk, masked owl and swift parrot.

“Currently the Forest Practices Code only attempts to protect the nesting habitat of rare, endangered and vulnerable species,” Ms Lloyd.

“Without the added protection of their food source and foraging and post breeding dispersal habitat, these species will continue to decrease.”

Although some species appear to be common in specific areas, they are suffering overall population decreases. Among these are the flame and dusky robins, southern boobook and dusky woodswallow.

Under current management programs, species must reach a critically low level before action is taken to aid population recovery.

Ms Lloyd also notes that a major problem for birds under current forestry practices is the diminishing number of old eucalypts that provide nesting hollows.

“Rotation times do not allow for trees to attain the age or size for the development of tree hollows.”

Read more on the pulp mill: http://www.tamarpulpmill.info/