Cyclone Yasi struck a heavy blow to both our regional communities and to the natural environment. But in the same way that people mobilised to assist each other, volunteers, NGOs and Governments have worked together to help out our threatened wildlife and some heartening stories are emerging.

The post-Yasi natural environment response has focused on providing support to endangered species, the Southern Cassowary and the Mahogany Glider as well as caring for wildlife in general. To minimise further damage to habitat and endangered ecosystems many people in Councils, Government Departments and other organisations have been working to train contractors and get information out to landholders and others involved in the clean-up effort. This has been especially urgent for the critically endangered Littoral Rainforest on the coast.

An area from Flying Fish Point south to the Cardwell Range, taking in Mission Beach, Tully and Cardwell were the most severely impacted, with some parts of the Atherton Tableland and Ingham areas also heavily impacted. But damage was sustained across a much larger area, with 24 Shires affected in total from here to the Northern Territory boarder.

After the cyclone, one of the first actions for the natural environment was to work out how heavily impacted threatened species were in the hard hit areas. Assessment has now shown severe impacts to around half of all remaining Mahogany Glider habitat with all habitat showing some impact. Approximately 50% of Cassowary Habitat was impacted by very destructive winds with a further 20% by destructive winds.

Drawing on what was learnt after Cyclone Larry, there was a quick response to the needs of the Southern Cassowary. QPWS undertook the initial impact assessment within several days of Yasi crossing the coast and immediately began setting up feed stations and coordinating landholders and volunteers to get food out to Cassowaries within 2 weeks. These actions took around 8 weeks to establish after Larry. Also 2 weeks after the Cyclone, 50 people came to a public meeting organised by Terrain to help cassowary habitat recovery. DERM, Main Roads, Council, and others were there to address peoples' concerns and work out how best to work together to help the Cassowaries.

To date, DERM have installed 100 cassowary feeding stations, with 32 landholders also supporting the program with feed stations on their properties. . Local people have given DERM tremendous support by reporting sick, injured or orphaned cassowaries (ph 1300 130 372) or near roads ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) and by volunteering to cut up fruit (ph 4091 8102). It is expected that supplementary feeding could last for 12-18 months until native fruits are producing in a large enough supply. Feed stations are located away from roads and backyards to reduce interaction between Cassowaries, people, traffic and dogs.

CSIRO, Birds Australia and DERM are collectively monitoring cassowaries following Yasi. The information being collected through people reporting sightings, and through a CSIRO program using faecal DNA to analyse the Cassowary population, will assist in our long term understanding of the condition of the species.

Once the Cassowary response was underway it quickly became clear that the endangered Mahogany Glider may be in dire circumstances. The Mahogany Glider occurs from south of Ollera Creek north to the Hull River and relies on nectar, sap and insects for food and numerous available tree hollows for dens. With 80% of its original habitat cleared and what remains becoming increasingly fragmented, the loss of food and den resources from the cyclone is of great concern. It is likely, with the added impact of the cyclone, that numbers of Mahogany Gliders will decline over the next years in narrow linear corridors and isolated fragments. The larger continuous habitat areas should be able to continue to sustain populations.

Wildlife Preservation Society of Queensland volunteers kicked off the recovery effort with Daryl Dickson coordinating a call for landholders to put their hands up to provide supplementary feed stations and den box areas on their properties. Terrain offered to take the calls through our Innisfail office. WPSQ in Brisbane appealed to their members to assist and were flooded with support. The RSPCA has been organising food mixes and numerous volunteer organisations have built den boxes.

DERM have established a Mahogany Glider Response Program and have been working hard to contact landholders, install feed stations and den boxes, set up monitoring points and coordinate volunteers. Around 70 feed stations at 20 different sites and 60 den boxes have been installed to date. Around 17 landholders are supporting the program. The feed stations may only be needed for a short time as blossom is already returning to several tree species in the area. WPSQ will assist in supporting this with funds from The Foundation for Australia's Most Endangered Species. The funding will also look at assessing the effectiveness of the response by using camera traps to monitor feed stations and checking occupancy of den boxes. This team will be lead by Dr John Winter and students from JCU and School for International Training. More volunteers will be required from Easter onwards to assist with monitoring. DERM will be also establishing permanent monitoring sites for long term monitoring of the species.

Many other organisations and supporters have become involved in Mahogany Glider recovery including Tolga Bat Hospital, Hollow Log Homes, Men's Shed Cairns, Men's Shed Brisbane, Hinchinbrook Shire Council, CCRC Disaster Management , Girringun Rangers, WTMA, Mossman High School, Brian Lennox, Carolyn Emms, QPWS Mossman (Tina Alderson), QPWS Mackay (Tina Ball), School for Field Studies, ABC Radio Far North, Channel 9 New Cairns. For more information go to the WPSQ website: http://www.wildlife.org.au/news/2011/cycloneyasi3.html

Those involved are also trying to reduce the threat of barbed wire fences to Mahogany Gliders with the opportunity to rebuild during cyclone recovery and replace the top strand with plain wire. For ideas on how to make a fence that is wildlife friendly go to http://www.wildlifefriendlyfencing.com

After Cyclone Larry in 2006, the environmental impact of both the cyclone and the clean-up effort generated concern. Impacts included hungry and wandering wildlife, especially Cassowaries; excessive clearing of vegetation; huge mulch piles posing a fire risk, as well as the fire risk to crops and habitat from large amounts of fallen vegetation; weeds being spread by clean-up equipment; weeds taking over damaged rainforest, and pigs.

One of the very encouraging things post-Yasi has been a much clearer integration of natural resource management issues into recovery activities leading to a faster response on many of the issues identified post-Larry. However they all still remain a problem, with mulch, fire and weed risk and damage to habitat from the clean-up effort being currently the greatest concern. Terrain has recently secured Cyclone Recovery funds allowing us to employ 50 people in work teams that will be specially trained in low impact habitat clean-up and targeted through DEEDI to work in areas with high quality natural values. Employment priority will be given to workers displaced by the Cyclone.

The clearest message to emerge from what we have learnt after Larry and Yasi is that larger areas of habitat with good connectivity are the most resilient to the impacts of natural disasters. The big cyclonic events that hit our region drive the combinations of species across the area. It is these events that can push a threatened species to extinction. Landscape resilience allows for recovery from natural disasters and adaptation to threats and changes. For the long term security of Cassowaries, Mahogany Gliders and other species, a connected landscape with adequate habitat areas is vital.

For more information about the natural environment and cyclone recovery visit:

Terrain: http://www.terrain.org.au/programs/biodiversity/cyclone-yasi-recovery.html

Wildlife Preservation Society of Queensland http://www.wildlife.org.au/news/2011/cycloneyasi3.html

Department of Environment and Resource Management http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/

Wet Tropics Management Authority http://www.wettropics.gov.au/