Many koalas in Redland City will miss out on any form of habitat protection if the State Government’s draft South East Queensland Koala Conservation Strategy is adopted in its current form.
Decisions critical for the survival of koalas in south east Queensland will be made by the State Government after community consultation over the summer holidays, closing on 31 January 2020.
The deadline for comments about the Government’s detailed mapping of Koala Habitat protection areas is 22 December 2019, just before Christmas.
All of Redland City is designated as a Koala Priority Area in the Government’s Draft South East Queensland Koala Conservation Strategy. But the only koala trees to get any protection in Redlands will be those located in areas officially mapped as Koala Habitat.
Many areas where koalas are regularly seen have been overlooked including most of Cleveland, Ormiston and Wellington Point.
Examples of the Government’s proposed mapping of koala habitat in many parts of Redland City are shown below, including a double image comparing areas proposed for protection with unprotected places where koalas actually live.
It appears that Redland City’s koala habitat will get significantly reduced protection if the Government’s draft strategy and mapping are adopted.
In Redlands, and probably elsewhere in south east Queensland, it seems that developers get better protection than koalas.
Help save our koalas
It’s time to tell the State Government to save our koalas
Some points to make in submissions to the State Government include:
- The draft koala habitat mapping fails to protect areas where many of our koalas are living right now as evidenced by koala sightings recorded in the Atlas of Living Australia
- Areas extensively planted with koala trees by the Redlands community over the past 30 years should be recognised in the Koala Habitat mapping
- Land removed from the Government’s mapping of Koala Habitat ahead of the draft strategy being released (including at Shoreline and south west Victoria Point) should be reinstated
- Areas of Redlands mapped previously as being of state environmental significance should be included as Koala Habitat, especially if ground-truthing evidence shows koala activity
- The proposal to let property owners have automatic rights to clear up to 500 m2 in Koala Habitat areas should be replaced with an impact assessment process
- The exemption allowing firebreaks to be developed and maintained in Koala Habitat areas is supported, provided that there are rules to prevent abuse
- A moratorium on clearing koala trees in Koala Priority Areas should be implemented (with effective sanctions) until the Strategy and Koala Habitat mapping are finalised
- The use of financial offsets as a mechanism for property owners and developers to buy the right to destroy koala habitat is unacceptable
- Analysis of overall gain/loss of koala habitat in south east Queensland should recognize that areas close to the coast such as the Redlands can sustain more koalas per hectare than other areas further west where it’s hotter and drier
- Public consultation periods for Koala Habitat mapping (to 22 December 2019) and the draft Strategy (to 31 January 2020) are inadequate – both periods should be extended
- The Government should undertake extensive community consultation about its strategy and mapping in Redland City, including drop in sessions and speaking at a public meeting
Have your say to State Environment Minister Leeanne Enoch using this submission template
You can edit the submission template to say what you really think. Include details of koala sightings in your local area, or the area which you believe should have proper koala habitat protection. Tell the Minister why you want koalas saved in Redlands.
Copies of submissions will go to:
- Planning Minister Cameron Dick
- Capalaba MP Don Brown
- Oodgeroo MP Mark Robinson
- Redlands MP Kim Richards
- Springwood MP Mick de Brenni
- CEO Redland City Council
Comments about the Government’s draft SEQ Koala Conservation strategy can also be made via an on-line survey on the Government’s website.
You may also be able to send feedback and questions to the government using this email address: SEQKoalaStrategy@des.qld.gov.au
Koalas in south east Queensland – the backstory
The alarming decline in south east Queensland koala numbers has been evident to the State Labor Government for more than four years:
- 31 August 2015, a scientific report is presented to the Government which says that there has been an alarming decline in koala numbers including an 80% drop in Redlands between 1996 and 2015
- 7 May 2016, the existence of this report is revealed by ABC News in: ‘Koala extinction imminent in parts of south-east Queensland, report warns’
- 7 May 2016, the State government announces appointment of a Koala Expert Panel
- 10 March 2017, the Koala Expert Panel’s Interim Report is released with the Government saying it accepts all of the Report’s recommendations
- 4 May 2018, the Koala Expert Panel’s Final Report (dated 2017) is released with the Government saying that it accepts all six of the Panel’s recommendations
- 22 November 2018, the State Government announces that it is appointing a Koala Advisory Council to ” coordinate and oversee the implementation of the recommendations from the Koala Expert Panel report”
- 8 December 2019, the State Government announces its draft SEQ Koala Conservation Strategy for public consultation until 29 January 2020, together with draft SEQ koala habitat mapping for consultation until 22 December 2019
Habitat protection mapping ignores where many koalas live
The problem with the State Government’s draft Strategy and Koala Habitat Mapping can be seen by comparing the blue and green areas in the double image.
The top map shows (in blue) where koalas live, based on reports to the Atlas of Living Australia by Koala Action Group members and other members of the community.
The bottom map of the same geographic area shows the State Government’s draft Koala Habitat mapping in green.
Areas mapped blue but not green are places where koalas want to live but won’t be protected by the State Government.
This includes parks and foreshore areas near Toondah Harbour as well as other open space areas in Redland City where koalas are observed often.
The new mapping covers less area in some places
Comparison of the Government’s proposed new Koala Habitat mapping with previous mapping shows that protected areas have been reduced. Here are two examples with the 2010 protection mapping on the left and the new mapping proposed by the State Government on the right.
Explore the proposed koala habitat protection mapping
To access the State Government’s Koala Habitat mapping on-line, go to this webpage and follow its instructions carefully.
For convenience, Redlands2030 has reproduced some of the Government’s Koala Habitat mapping below.
These maps show areas marked for koala habitat protection in the coastal parts of mainland Redland City from Thorneside to the mouth of the Logan River. Proposed koala habitat protection for the Commonwealth lands in Birkdale is also shown – in the second image.
These maps were all copied from the Government’s on-line mapping of proposed Koala Habitat protection areas, on 15 December 2019.
Redlands2030 – 16 December 2019
Please note: Offensive or off-topic comments will be deleted. If offended by any published comment please email thereporter@redlands2030.net
14 Comments
The residents of S E Qld are asking the Labor State Government to act in the best interests of all of our koalas, not just the ones that are conveniently located in areas away from proposed development sites. The Indigenous people of North Stradbroke Island have cared for their environment for thousands of years and they do not want to see the protected wetland zones destroyed by a few greedy developers who consider only one aspect, profits. Likewise the residents of the Redlands have chosen this area to live because of the great lifestyle and the natural surroundings with koalas, shore-birds, dugong, dolphins and migrating whales. We need to conserve all of our wildlife because their survival depends on a healthy habitat. Disturbance of the acid sulphate soils alone, will cause the death of seagrass beds that are the food source of dugong and turtles.
More to the back ground . There iz the phenomena of “‘elicitation “‘ where a group of Phd decide that modelling can proceed without obzervation mapping in part of the Government or other Mapping. The modelling haz been developed over a 5 year period by Koala Rezearch Network arguably without public conzultation or public critique or academic refutation. The koala mapping iz printed in map E ” with and without koala obzervationz” ; Mandy Downz -Acting Director Conzervation Policy and Planning.
Independent comparing of koala obzervation mapping and 3 different habitat typez in Map E point to variable lack of overlap. There are a variety of areaz ; in , out, corridorz,other mapping in ,urban footprint, and more fieldwork needed. The luzury of fizing the modelling and not the mapping muzt be rezizted.
51 years I’ve lived in the Redlands and very sadly seen the number of koalas plummet.
Something has to be done now. Extinction is far too close.
With the deaths of so many koalas and other animals in these bushfires every bit of land where they live should be a sanctuary and not developed. Too many houses now
Please appreciate and save koalas. Don’t be so interested in money and popularity
This is another example of government acting for there own gain. They no longer even try to hide their total disregard for what the Australian people want. Filling their own pockets and the pockets of the already rich.
The Australian people demand you stop killing our country, stop polluting , stop selling our lands and killing out fauna and flora and support and protect the Australian people. Ignoring the people in their time of need with the current bushfires and drought is criminal. I would say you should be ashamed of you behaviour but I feel I’m yelling in the wind.
I hope we can find away to rid our country of this disease which has infected the government with out the need to destroy our way of life.
Please save all our Koalas!!!!
I couldn’t bear the thought of losing a National Icon the Koala.
We need to help our little beauties before it’s to late we need to save all wild life. It’s bad enough with the Bush fires wiping them out and the government is destroying our land and selling it off to foreigners we all need to take a stand and save a our koalas and other wild life …
Please make sure all Koala areas are protected not just the ones you haven’t marked for development etc. You can’t exclude koala areas on the map to suit your own needs.
Save the koala for future generations
Please help reserve the last of or koalas by protecting their areas and making it a priority to plant corridors of their trees. One idea is to plant their trees on the Islands and bring them over here. Island people love their wildlife.
The problem for koalas, according to the latest mapping, is that some known koala habitat is excluded from protection because the areas conflict with proposed development sites. Even a cursory view of the area of Cleveland south of the Raby Bay Canal Estate shows that none of it is included in the protection zone yet the only area in the Redlands where I have see four koalas in the one large eucalypt tree is in Shore Street East near G J Walter Park. That is a well known tree called the Family Koala Tree because it provides regular habitat for a number of koalas. In fact the Koala Action Group has recorded 18 koalas inhabiting the trees in this area. Why have none of these trees been included in the protection zone? I believe it is because that area is designated area for high density housing. Large unit blocks for human habitation and eucalypt areas for koala habitation are mutually exclusive. The question then arises – how serious is the state government about protecting known koala habitat in the coastal regions of the Redlands ??
As Shania Twain said in one of her songs, “you’re joking right”. Just looking at the area of Koala sightings v’s Koala habitat as mapped by the State Government, it’s plain as day there’s no prime land to be had by our friend Quicky Koala. The only thing quick about it will be Quick’s demise, and how dare anyone suggest our native fauna actually inhabit land that borders the bay shoreline, don’t we understand any such property must be seen as God given, something to be dangled before greedy developers by brain dead politicians and councilors?
I’m certainly no raving activist from the far left, but fair dinkum, the rate of development and destruction of Australia’s forests and farmlands sees no bounds, one could be forgiven for thinking the world was actually ending in twelve years, just going by our apparent need to lay the land bare before sunrise.
What happened to the steady as she goes approach as was the way of our Grandfathers, what’s wrong with boring natural population growth, and just how many future generations over the next thousand years or so do our politicians think will be requiring a reasonable lifestyle? At the current rate of development, there won’t be much left in a thousand years, which is such a short time in the overall scheme of things. There’s little doubt this disgusting ME and NOW greed mentality rules the day, and is far more important to the decision making deadheads, than the needs of our Grandchildren’s children and beyond.
The current rate of Australia’s development is so obviously unsustainable, even the most unintuitive idiot can see this, so too the most inept and naive of politicians and Councilors, as well as their limpets in big business. So, what is the main driver then? Oh, that’s right, of course, it’s greed, plain and simple!
It’s no surprise the mechanism allowing this state of affairs to flourish is excessive immigration, no doubt about it, the evidence is there for all to see, a population that has just about doubled in the past 35 years. Our major cities are bursting at the seams, creating an overflow of people spilling from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane as they escape the suffocation, eventually filtering into other States and areas, and into the waiting arms of inept councils and avarice developers. It’s frightening really, particularly when you look at the figures from 1890 up to the second world war, where the rate of immigration was just 10% over that 50 year time span, and this is not to demean the contribution by post war migrants who arrived through the fifties and sixties for example, which was a time of nation building.
It’s crazy, while our population has doubled in the past 35 years, we have not built one dam or embarked on a single nation building project that would enhance and manage the water resources of the planets driest continent, water resources anyone with half a brain would see as paramount to the servicing of our ever expanding and artificially fueled population growth. But of course, it’s all about the selling of houses, cars and toilet rolls.
While ever we listen to the failed thinking of those who champion a BIG AUSTRALIA, our national debt will continue to increase out of control, the quality of life and services enjoyed by our children’s children will suffer as they are forced to service that debt, and the flora and fauna we currently enjoy will be a thing of the past.