Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713:body:0:p20
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 126590–129601

or without a wetland forest in the supratidal area. There are records from forests of grey mangrove (Avicenna marina), large-leafed orange mangrove (Bruguiera gymnorhiza), river mangrove (Aegiceras corniculatum), milky mangrove (Excoecaria agallocha), spotted mangrove (Rhizophora stylosa), spurred (or yellow) mangrove (Ceriops tagal), smooth-fruited yellow mangrove (Ceriops australis), broad-leaved paperbark (Melaleuca quinquenervia) and/or swamp she-oak (Casuarina glauca), and adjacent open vegetation communities (Van Dyck 1994, 1996; Van Dyck & Gynther 2003; Russel & Hale 2009; Gynther 2011; Kaluza & Bolzenius 2015; Kaluza 2016b; 2016c; 2013; 2018; 2019; Sutherland 2017).
There are also water mouse records from near-brackish and freshwater wetlands and swamps, and wet heath in southeast Queensland (Dwyer 1979; Russell & Hale 2009; Gynther 2011).
The water mouse is known to create a wide variety of protective mud shelter types in intertidal areas in this region, including within hollow mangroves and other trees and as distinctive free-standing mounds (see Section 3.5).

Figure 2: Examples of water mouse habitat along the southern Queensland coast: saltmarsh, coastal reeds, mangroves, mixed mangrove and saltmarsh, brackish sedgeland.
Sources: © Janina Kaluza (Top three panoramas @ Kauri Creek in 2015), © Ashley Rummell (large central image @ Maroochy River), © Melissa Bruton (bottom left & bottom centre @ Maroochy Wetlands Sanctuary in 2021) and © Ian Gynther (bottom right @ Bribie Island).

Recorded habitat: central Queensland coast (Gladstone to Cannonvale)
Due to limited survey effort, water mouse habitat requirements are not well defined along the central Queensland coast. This species may occur in coastal and subcoastal habitats that are yet to be recorded for this region. In the Gladstone-Curtis Island area water mouse detections have occurred in forests of spotted mangrove and yellow mangroves (Ceriops spp.) with adjacent marine couch (QGC 2013). Along the Mackay coast it occurs in forests of spurred mangrove and orange mangroves (Bruguiera spp.) (Ball 2004). The water mouse occurs patchily in mangrove forests along the Mackay coast where extensive targeted detection surveys have occurred, with the cause of this patchiness unclear (Ball 2004).
Freshwater areas that may provide habitat for the water mouse are now rare along the Mackay coast (Ball 2004; Ball 2021 pers. comm.). There is a historical record of five water mice collected from a permanent grassy Pandanus swamp about "one mile from the sea" (McDougall 1944).
In this region, the water mouse mostly uses mud ramp shelters constructed among the buttress roots of live and dead mangroves, and it may also construct tunnels into supralittoral banks (Ball 2004; Ball 2021 pers. comm.). The water mouse rarely creates distinctive freestanding mounds along the central Queensland coast (Ball 2021 pers. comm.). A suspected mud shelter in a human spoil pile is reported from Curtis Island (QGC 2013).
Figure