Thoughts towards a forest wildlife management strategy

Summary

Wildlife management is becoming increasingly important in Australian forestry and this paper presents the conceptual framework for a relevant wildlife management strategy. Wildlife management in Australian forests might best be co-ordinated nationally. Because of the changing public perceptions of the role forestry must play in wildlife management in native forest, suggestions are made for the modification of present practice which will benefit both timber and wildlife management. The paper also reviews information requirements, the issues and the concerns important in the determination of such a strategy. Information bases are necessary for sound forest wildlife management. The concepts of minimum viable population and optimum habitat are discussed as well as wildlife management design in terms of zoning and the two integrated methods of core population and dispersed population techniques. It is argued that the standards of forest management have to improve to achieve the necessary balance between timber production and wildlife management. This will require an understanding of the aforementioned two concepts and the options available for integrating wildlife and timber management. Priority should be given to the determination of optimum habitat of species, forest site classification and the ranking of wildlife species according to management need.