Emma BurgessPhD Candidate

Advisors: Dr Martine Maron, Dr Patrick Moss &Murray Haseler

• Private nature reserve managed by Bush Heritage Australia

• Located in Brigalow Belt Bioregion, central QLD

• BBB extensively cleared: 61% native veg cleared since European settlement in 1840’s

• Overarching goal: restore the condition, functioning & dynamics of the assemblages of species that would have been present prior to European settlement

• Fire important management tool: 1. Mitigate wildfires2. Maintain veg. structures that benefit faunal assemblages

• Mosaic burning approach

• Pyrodiversity begets biodiversity

• At what scale does pyrodiversity influence biodiversity?

Alpha (α) diversity

Gamma (γ) diversity

Beta (β) diversity

• Components of biodiversity:

Mosaic burning

No active control

Long unburnt

protected

Heterogeneous veg. mosaic

Removal key

resource(s)

Wildfire

Homogeneous veg. mosaic

++

++

-

-

--

-

Gamma diversity

Beta diversity

Alpha diversity

Alpha, beta & gamma diversity (birds):•Environmental heterogeneity (range in elevation)

» However, explanatory power varied depending on spatial scale& component of diversity under investigation

•Limited support for pyrodiversity begets biodiversity paradigm

Foraging guilds:•Different correlates of richness within particular guilds & depending on spatial scale e.g.

Extent longer unburnt vegetation:•Frugivores, insectivores, nectarivores, carnivores & canopy feeders

1. Things we can’t control important- landscape context

2. Not pyrodiversity, but extent of longer UB (> 10 yrs since last fire)

3. BUT management approaches considered appropriate are dependent on the scale at which a biodiversity conservation goal is conceptualised

Advisory team: Dr Martine Maron (UQ); Dr Patrick Moss (UQ); &Murray Haseler (Bush Heritage Australia)

Funding: AndyInc. Foundation; GPEM

Volunteers: Peta Mather; Donna Oliver