Pungalina Seven Emu Carbon Abatement

Wildfires – fires that occur in the late dry season, burning at high intensity across large areas – are a major threat to biodiversity in the Gulf Bioregions.

This project aims to prevent late-dry season wildfires by re-establishing a regime of ecologically friendly planned burns of savanna areas in the early dry season, thereby creating a mosaic of vegetation of different age-classes across the landscape and reducing the frequency and extent of late dry season wildfires in the landscape.

In a landmark partnership between a not-for-profit conservation organisation and an Indigenous landholder, Frank Shadforth has subleased 110,000 hectares of Seven Emu – almost half the area of the pastoral lease – to the Australian Wildlife Conservancy (AWC). The station’s cattle are kept out of this conservation zone.

The whole sanctuary comprises an unbroken stretch of 305,000 hectares from the sandstone uplands to the coastal waters of the Gulf. It protects a suite of habitats along an important ecological gradient in one of the highest-priority regions in Australia, as well as delivering significant socio-economic benefits for Indigenous communities.