Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary – Bushland Regeneration Project

In October 2022 Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary (CWS) Bushland Regeneration Project was completed. With the support of staff and 15 Queensland trainees (our volunteers) from a local community training organisation.

At the completion of the project not only did 8ha’s of natural bushland within our 27ha receive much needed attention but many of these trainees graduated with their Certificate I in Conservation Ecosystems Management.

The project got off to a slow start, impacted by the Omnicom strain emerging alongside flood impacts on CWS and students enrolled in the course. Despite delays on the 23rd of May we started our journey with 15 eager participants’. Project activities included maintaining wildlife environments, building new habitats, managing invasive weed species in natural wildlife habitats, stabilizing sloping land by planting ground covers, removal of fuel loads to reduce bushfire risk, clearing and maintaining bush walking tracks. Several active tree hollows were identified with lorikeets and cockatoos and the native vegetation was noted to be in overall good health.

The project conducted an initial primary run of a buffer zone of 20m on either side of the current 1.2km Discovery Trail Track within the 8ha’s and commenced work into a substantial portion of the surrounding areas as well as planted at least 2,000 native plants and trees.

We picked up 2,215 plants (45 different species) from Friends of the Koala Nursery on the 6th of June as part of the project and over the course of the project planted all these plants. The area was heavily degraded with many weed species threating the sites biodiversity, as such weeding and weed identification formed the largest component of this project.

The trainees also received their AC/DC chemical license, formed great friendships and one student has gained employment and will be working at CWS shortly as a casual.