Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L01094:body:0:p14
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L01094
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 42900–46068

reducing fuel loads through burning. Manual removal of fuel loads around mature white gum trees in critical forty-spotted pardalote habitat may be considered as an alternative.

2.9 Habitat critical to the survival
Habitat critical to the survival of a species or ecological community encompasses areas that are necessary:

  for activities such as foraging, breeding, roosting, or dispersal;

  for the long-term maintenance of the species or ecological community (including the maintenance of species essential to the survival of the species or ecological community);

  to maintain genetic diversity and long-term evolutionary potential;

  for the reintroduction of populations or recovery of the species or ecological community.

Such habitat may be, but is not limited to: habitat identified in a Recovery Plan for the species or ecological community as habitat critical for that species or ecological community, and/or habitat listed on the Register of Critical Habitat maintained by the Minister under the EPBC Act. Further information can be found in the Significant Impact Guidelines 1.1 - Matters of National Environmental Significance.

Habitat critical to the survival of the forty-spotted pardalote include:

Foraging habitat:

     All white gum forest within the known range of the forty-spotted pardalote. This includes any forest and woodland supporting white gum as dominant or subdominant canopy, including single trees.

Breeding habitat:

     Living (mature) and dead trees of any Eucalypt species with hollows with small entrances and crevices suitable for nesting which are within the known range of the species.

  Habitat for the long-term maintenance of the species or for the reintroduction of populations:

     White gum forest that could support the reintroduction of a viable forty-spotted pardalote population. This may include, but is not limited to, habitat that recently supported breeding colonies;

     All Key Biodiversity Areas with forty-spotted pardalote as a Trigger species;

     Suitable habitat in future climate niches as information becomes available.

It is also important to consider and maintain connectivity, buffer zones, and refugia habitat for the species. Sympathetic management of areas adjoining forty-spotted pardalote habitats is important, such as woodland and forest. Habitat connectivity is important for maintaining or enhancing species genetic diversity and long-term evolutionary potential. Potential or planned release sites for translocations and reintroductions are also considered habitat critical to the survival of forty-spotted pardalote and should be afforded the same level of protection and conservation management as known sites.

Habitat critical to the survival of forty-spotted pardalote occurs across a range of land tenures, including freehold land and reserves, publicly owned forests and state reserves, and national parks. It is essential that the locations where the species regularly occurs are given the highest protection and conservation measures target these productive habitats.

Increasing the extent and quality of habitat critical to the survival of the species through