Media Release
Environment groups are celebrating the creation of three new national parks and two conservation parks by the state government in Victoria’s central west
Legislation passed the Legislative Council on the evening of the 18th November to create the Wombat-Lerderderg, Mount Buangor and Pyrenees national parks along with the Hepburn and Cobaw conservation parks. The Wellsford State Forest has been reclassified as a regional park.
Members of Wombat Forestcare have been campaigning for greater protection of Wombat Forest for fifteen years, and park status is a recognition of the very high conservation and catchment values of the forest.
Over many years, Wombat Forestcare, working with the Victorian National Parks Association, has lobbied the state government to protect these forests in parks.
Gayle Osborne, convenor, Wombat Forestcare said that
“These forests exist in a landscape that has been highly cleared of native vegetation and represent incredibly
important habitat for the persistence of very many threatened plants, animals and fungi.”“This is a massive step for the protection of the amazing and wonderful plants, animals and fungi that inhabit our forests.”
“We congratulate the state government for legislating these parks. National parks are the cornerstone of biodiversity conservation in Australia, and the creation of these parks will ensure that these forests are safeguarded for future generations.”
The Wombat Forest is a ‘stronghold’ for the protection of many threatened native species including the Greater Glider, Powerful Owl, Brush-tailed Phascogale and the endemic Wombat Leafless Bossiaea.
The park will also protect the Wombat Forest as a water catchment with the headwaters of seven major river systems contained in the forest, and the value the forest provides in terms of ecosystem services and carbon sequestration.
Gayle Osborne said
“The national parks are only part of the undertaking by the government for the central west. There are regional parks, and bushland reserves still to be legislated, and we hope that these can be created before the end of the year.”
Wombat Forestcare is quite disappointed that the government has decided to allow recreational deer hunting in parts of the new Wombat-Lerderderg National Park. This is not an appropriate activity in a national park and will not substantially reduce deer numbers. Parks Victoria engage professional shooters to carry out their pest control
programs.
Photo: Wombat Forestcare members campaigning for the national park. © Sandy Scheltema.