Tidbinbilla Sanctuary is a testament to the ability of the Australian landscape to bounce back from devastation, now marking a decade since it reopened after the bushfires.
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It took five years for the sanctuary to reopen after the devastation of the 2003 Canberra bushfires, and Wednesday marked the 10 year anniversary of its reopening by former chief minister Jon Stanhope in 2008.
ACT Parks and Conservation manager Brett McNamara is proud to show the sanctuary in its renewed, “robust” form, protector and home to thousands of animals, in the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve.
Authorities have included artworks and design in the sanctuary, with “subtle little design elements ... paying homage to the past”, Mr McNamara said.
Conservation of endangered species is a priority for Tidbinbilla, and the sanctuary has multiple breeding programs attempting to renew populations of different animals.
Fewer than 1000 northern corroboree frogs are left in the wild, due to chytrid fungus and climate change.
“I can remember as a very young ranger back in the 1990s and the ground beneath your feet would erupt from the frog calls of the corroboree frogs. Fast forward some 30 years and there’s probably half a dozen or so left,” Mr McNamara said.
Now, the northern corroboree frog is doing much better due to the Tidbinbilla breeding program’s success.
Another threatened species included in Tidbinbilla’s endangered species program is the southern brush-tailed rock wallaby, named for the way their tails smoothed the rocks underfoot as they crashed through the undergrowth of the bush.
There are fewer than 40 of the species left in the wild, where they used to be “very very common”.
Conservation of endangered species is not the only success of the Tidbinbilla Sanctuary.
“The point is about just nature and people. Connecting people back with nature again. This sanctuary just provides people with that opportunity just to sit to relax and to immerse themselves in nature. I think given the lifestyles we lead today being rushed, that’s what the sanctuary provides,” Mr McNamara said, of what he described as one of Tidbinbilla’s greatest achievements since it reopened.
“It’s a sanctuary in terms of wildlife but I often think of it as a sanctuary for people to come to in terms of their own personal journeys.”
