The rising impact of climate change in the ACT has been spelled out in a major study of the future of the territory's parks and reserves.
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The ACT government has called for public views on its "Canberra Nature Park management plan".
The document is a detailed and powerful description of the state of the 37 parks and reserves known collectively as the Canberra Nature Park.
The plan affects the whole city because the planners estimate that 400,000 Canberrans live close to nature, with a quarter of the city's population living within a hundred metres of a reserve and nearly half within 500 metres.
The plan details how nature in the territory has already been impacted by global warming.
Some species are seen more in Canberra as the changing climate alters their natural patterns and paths. Others are vanishing.
The report spells out the changes:
- "The Superb Parrot was only an occasional spring or summer vagrant within the ACT. Today more than 100 birds are observed in the ACT during spring and summer.
- "Several ACT frog species are starting breeding calls earlier in the year."
- There's been a "dramatic reduction in the Grassland Earless Dragon population, to the point where there was a real risk of local extinction."
As the climate changes, ACT ecologists are planning to increase the connections between the different reserves, creating corridors between the islands of nature where threatened species take refuge from urban encroachment.
This will mean planting more shrubs and plants to make the corridors and reserves more congenial for animals. More fallen trees might be useful to some species. By having corridors, the range of feeding places is increased.
The ACT's director of parks, planning and policy, Trish Bootes, said she wanted to hear views on the big picture and also on the detail - what people hope for from the city's nature reserves in general but also the particular one nearby.
The city planners are trying to identify footpaths, for example. Formal, mapped ones are known about but short-cuts aren't.
"We want to know which it makes sense to keep and which to remove," said Ms Bootes.
She said she wanted to encourage the use of the reserves but in a way that protects their future.
The city planners are worried about some types of tree. Yellow Box and Blakely's Red Gum are "listed as an endangered community in the ACT", said the report.
The planners are also wrestling with the problem of "an estimated stray cat population of around 25,000".
"Research has shown that domestic and stray cats kill a large range of native species including birds, sugar gliders, bats, lizards, frogs and a range of invertebrates."
"Nationally agreed methods of controlling feral cats, such as shooting and trapping, are prohibitively labour-intensive and may be ineffective."
The draft plan can be seen at www.yoursay.act.gov.au/act-parks.
Steve Evans
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
