Around 10 years ago a local movement set out with a simple yet ambitious goal, to save native flora and fauna.
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The K2W Glideways Link Partnership, which supports conservation in the Kanangra-Boyd to Wyangala area, partnered with projects in the NSW Great Eastern Ranges to replenish green corridors, restore riparian areas and give native wildlife a fighting chance of survival.
The NSW Government supported the project through its Environmental Trust, the K2W Glideways Bushconnect project received almost $500,000 with the Foundation of National Parks Wildlife (FNPW) leading a consortium of community groups, non-government organisations and government agencies to deliver the funding.
In January, the project completed six years which was co-funded by the Environmental Trust; over the next four years the K2W Glideways Link Partnership will continue this essential conservation work.
Across three districts, the Upper Lachlan, Blue Mountains and Cowra, the K2W Glideways has partnered with the community to deliver the project.
Grazing, urban development and large-scale industrial projects disrupted the habitat and the abundance of wildlife, and reconnecting the landscape is vital to the survival of native species, including the threatened gliding possums.
"Landholders and local environmental groups are so important in helping to protect and create habitat connections across the landscape," project officer Mary Bonet said.
"By partnering with the community we were able to restore important areas of native bushland through installing nest boxes and enhancing biodiversity by creating more green corridors.
"These linkages will continue to preserve and protect endangered and threatened species."
The K2W Glideways program works with local community groups and landholders on a range of collaborative projects in a section of the Abercrombie catchment, called the K2W Link.
The program aims to restore natural connections for wildlife by relinking the landscape to ensure that our populations of animals persist into the future.
These onground works include controlling invasive species, habitat restoration and protection, revegetation, citizen science and research and monitoring across the Abercrombie catchment.
The region is a major natural connection between the Greater Blue Mountains and Wyangala Dam, and is used by a countless number of species on their daily, seasonal and annual migration.
It is home to five of the six species of gliding possum found in Australia - squirrel glider, yellow-bellied glider, feathertail glider, sugar glider and greater glider - and over 2,400 species of native plants, animals, fish and reptiles.
This area contains an extraordinarily diverse range of species and habitats and is rich in culture and heritage.
At the same time the K2W Link is under threat from increasing numbers of feral animals and weeds, habitat loss due to fragmentation and urban development and has the potential for continued loss of landscape health. Like other animals in the area, populations of gliders have been declining.
"If we do nothing to assist gliders, populations will continue to fall and we will lose them from our landscape forever," Mary said.
"Through targeted projects in strategic locations we are working to help prevent further losses, whilst supporting the habitat and connectivity needs of the many other plants and animals that share their homes.
"By meeting the needs of gliders we are also supporting the other plants and animals that share their homes such as Spotted-tailed Quolls, Flame Robins, Booroolong Frogs, Glossy Black Cockatoo, Platypus, and Koalas."
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