Client: Department of Sustainability and Environment
Location: Melbourne
Key Services Provided:
- Review of literature
- Development of field management guide
- Development of conceptual model
- Guidelines for institutional implementations
Overview
This project was instigated by the Sustainable Water, Environment and Innovation Division of the Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE). This project resulted in the following outcomes:
- A literature review on the use of controlled grazing in ‘typical’ riparian zones across Victoria;
- The development of a decision support framework to predict the relative effects of controlled stock grazing on native riparian vegetation;
- The provision of guidelines and recommendations about the management of controlled grazing within riparian zones of varying vegetation type and condition; and
- Recommendations on how to institutionalise any suggested controlled grazing regimes.
The second and third outcomes resulted in the production of a simple Decision Support Tool for appropriate agency field staff, and facilitated the decision-making for the use of grazing, or otherwise, as a riparian management tool in a three-tiered process: it provided a key for identifying the most frequently observed states of riparian zones across the broader landscape of Victoria, described the characteristics and likely land use history and possible transitions that may occur with sites of that state, and provided significant guidance as to the likely outcomes of the imposition, continuation or exclusion of stock grazing.
Contact:
Jamie Kaye (jamie.kaye@watech.com.au)
Senior Ecologist
Phone 03 5721 2650
PO Box 792, Wangaratta VIC 3676