Cravens Peak Reserve

Ten members of BASQ visited Bush Heritage's Cravens Peak Reserve from the 18th to 28th April 2007, as part of a scientific study organised by the Royal Queensland Geographical Society. The visit was delayed until the country dried after heavy rain.

Cravens Peak is south west of Boulia on the Queensland side of the Northern Territory border. The 233,000 ha reserve is divided into two subregions.

The Toko Plain subregion includes spectacular landforms — gorges, dissected uplands (photo 1), alluvial flats and gibber plains (photo 2) , bounded to the north and east by the Toko Range and to the west by the Toomba Range. The Simpson-Strzelecki Dunefields subregion extends up through the middle of the property. The red dunes average 9 m in height (photo 3).

Both subregions contain claypans that at times fill to become ephemeral swamps (photo 4). The property lies across the boundary of the Simpson-Strzelecki Dunefields and Channel Country bioregions.

Bird communities were studied in the two subregions using BA Atlas methods. Bird species were compared in the two subregions considering species groups according to the vegetation systems they were surveyed in. Species richness and species relative abundance were compared. The data revealed that species are distributed largely on the basis of habitat. In general, areas with a higher number of vegetation strata recorded higher species diversity. Overall, the tall open Acacia georginae shrubland (photo 5) on the alluvial floodplains has a higher diversity of birds in a 2-ha area.

Bird species richness was greatest in wet regions (channel country and ephemeral swamps) while areas with little water contained little species richness.
The number of strata in a vegetative community is significant. The Eucalyptus woodland communities (photo 6) with five vegetative strata (floodplain) contained high species diversity.
Vegetation communities then progressively on average decreased in species diversity as the number of stratas decreased, three vegetative strata (tall open shrubland), two vegetative strata (open shrubland) and one vegetative stratum (grassland).

A total of 119 species of birds distributed among 37 families and 15 orders were encountered in the Reserve. Of the 119 species, 110 were found in the Toko Plain subregion and 69 species in the Simpson-Strzelecki Dunefields.

Most of the birds at Cravens Peak were nomadic insectivores which travel in search of available resources. The birds identified from the survey are listed below.