11 - Recommendations for plantation managers: implications for biodiversity and conservation in plantations

Summary

The preceding chapters have highlighted the extensive and diverse body of scientific research that has taken place at Tumut over the past 12 years. The work was originally intended as a largely theoretical landscape ecology and conservation biology study, primarily focused on quantifying landscape context effects on biota (see Chapters 4 and 5). However, as the research programme has progressed, it has become increasingly clear that the findings from the research at Tumut (as well as those from the nearby Nanangroe area; Lindenmayer et al., 2008b; see also Chapter 10) have implications for biodiversity conservation in plantation landscapes. Some of these lessons might apply not only elsewhere in Australia (Lindenmayer and Hobbs, 2004; Salt et al., 2004), but also in the extensive areas of plantation elsewhere in the world. This chapter briefly outlines a set of recommendations arising from the Tumut research that aim to improve conservation management practices within plantations.

The significance of plantation expansion as a form of landscape change

Around the world, large-scale landscape change resulting from human land use (UNEP, 1999) is a major driver of altered ecosystem processes (McIntyre and Hobbs, 1999; Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 2005) and biodiversity loss (Sala et al., 2000; Lindenmayer and Fischer, 2006).