Revegetated Sand Mining Areas,Swamp Wallabies and Remote Sensing: North Stradbroke Island,Queensland

Mining of mineral sands has taken place on North Stradbroke Island for over 40 years. Revegetation of mined areas creates a mosaic of seral classes. For a mine site in the northwest of the island, Landsat Thematic Mapper data were used successfully to map the distribution of seven seral classes resulting from mining rehabilitation. Faecal pellet counts were used to assess usage of these areas and surrounding natural forest by swamp wallabies, Wallabia bicolor. Results indicated that revegetated sites from 2 to 4 years in age were heavily used by wallabies. Older revegetated sites, dominated by senile Acacia cunninghamii, and offering little or no forage, were avoided. Swamp wallabies used revegetated sites for night-time feeding sessions and rested, during the day, in surrounding eucalypt forest.