New national park at Dryandra Woodland a win for critically endangered numbat
A new national park has been created in the heart of Western Australia’s Wheatbelt, providing greater security for the future of some of the state’s most endangered animals.
Key points:
- The woodland near Narrogin will now be classified as a national park
- About 15,000 hectares will be given greater levels of conservation
- It raises questions over why other areas aren’t being afforded the same protection
The Dryandra Woodland near Narrogin is the natural home of numbats, woylies and western quolls, and is the largest remnant of the original vegetation before it was cleared for broadacre farming.
Reece Whitby, the state’s new Environment Minister, said the project to turn the woodlands into a national park had been decades in the making.
“If you look at a map of the clearing that’s occurred in the Wheatbelt, this is the last important preserved large woodland area,” he said.
“[It] makes it unique in the Wheatbelt, which makes it so important that this becomes our first national park in the Wheatbelt.”
Full article here – ABC
