WA's threatened ecological communities |
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The conservation of elements of biodiversity threatened with extinction or destruction is a key role of the department. Biodiversity has three main elements: genetic diversity, species diversity and ecosystem diversity. Modern biodiversity conservation strategies are aimed at conserving all these elements. Threatened biodiversity conservation strategies were traditionally aimed at species, however, species planning now includes genetic diversity conservation and is augmented by ecological community conservation. Ecological communities (naturally occurring biological assemblages that occur in a particular type of habitat) are the sum of species within ecosystems and, as a whole, provide many of the processes that support specific ecosystems and provide 'ecological services'. Ecosystems are much more than the sum of their parts. The myriad of interactions between their component species provides an important third level of biological diversity in addition to those of genes and species. Because ecosystems and the links between their community members are so complex, it is impossible to maintain their components on a species by species basis. While it is important to manage individual threatened species of animals and plants, we can not give the same individual attention as we do to vertebrates and vascular plants to the many thousands of species of invertebrates, non-vascular plants and micro-organisms. To conserve these components of biological diversity, we need to identify, maintain and manage whole ecosystems, their processes and communities. Further, it is more cost-effective and efficient to prevent species becoming threatened by conserving them as part of viable, functioning communities than it is to attempt to manage species on a species by species basis. The department has been identifying and informally listing threatened ecological communities (TECs) for 13 years. At January 2008, 173 ecological communities had been entered into the department's TEC database. Of these, 21 have been endorsed by the Director of Nature Conservation as Critically Endangered, 17 as Endangered, 28 as Vulnerable and three as Presumed Totally Destroyed. The remainder are either awaiting endorsement as threatened or are allocated to one of five priority lists. As is the case for species, the department, with the help of community groups and local people, is developing and implementing Recovery Plans and Interim Recovery Plans for TECs. To better inform people about TECs, the department has commenced production of a series of posters. The posters briefly describe a community and what needs to be done to conserve it. Further information about these communities and other Western Australian TECs informally listed as threatened can be obtained by This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it from DEC's Threatened Species and Communities Unit.
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Priority ecological communities list (August 2008) (
