More Than 1/3 Of NSW Rainforests - 3.5 Million Ha Of Best Remaining Koala Habitat - Burned
More than a third of New South Wales rainforest was among 5.4m hectares hit by last season’s catastrophic bushfires, according to new state government data. The report, an updated assessment of the effect of the fires on wildlife and landscapes, said 293 threatened animal species and 680 threatened plant species have habitat in the state’s fire ground. The affected area includes more than 3.5m hectares of the state’s best koala habitat.
Almost six months on from the crisis, the impact of the fire season is only beginning to be understood. Recovery work has begun in some areas, while in others, the Covid-19 pandemic shut down early assessment work.
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Of the national parks in the fire ground, the analysis found 23% have had their canopy fully affected and 36% partially affected. In state forests, those figures are 17% and 32% respectively. The report rated the ecological condition of forests in the fire ground, which is a measure of the quality and the intactness of habitat compared to its original condition.
Within the NSW RFS fire ground, 72% of the original ecological was estimated as remaining in 2013. In 2020, that figure has decreased to 44% the report states. The analysis also looked at the ability of these locations to support native species and ecosystems, what is known as “ecological carrying capacity”. It estimated that within the fire ground 62% of the original carrying capacity remained in 2013. That had now fallen to 38%.
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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2020/jun/07/more-than-a-third-of-nsw-rainforests-found-to-have-been-hit-by-australian-bushfires