QTPN Flora Discovery Project

Flora Discovery Project: empowering conservation groups to conduct threatened flora surveys in Queensland

The ANPC is excited to announce that we have been selected as one of 2025’s Bank Australia community customer grant recipients, to support our Queensland Threatened Plant Network (QTPN*) Flora Discovery Project. These grants aim to grow the impact of Bank Australia customers who are making a difference in areas such as nature and biodiversity, climate action, affordable and accessible housing and First Nations Recognition and Respect.

Five Flora Survey Training Workshops will be held during 2025/26 to train community-based volunteer groups and citizen scientists in regional areas of Queensland to undertake targeted native flora surveys and fill key gaps in our knowledge of our threatened plants. The workshops will build their capacity to conduct strategic and highly valuable surveys of rare flora, and assist in the long term planning, implementation and monitoring of recovery actions for these species.

Queensland is the most biodiverse state in Australia with over 14,000 species of native plants and plant-like species such as algae and lichens. Over 1000 of these plants are listed as threatened (under the Queensland Nature Conservation Act and the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act), making up 78% of all of Queensland’s threatened species. Many of these plants are poorly known and under-surveyed. Without baseline data on their population sizes and health, it is very difficult to prevent their extinction.

Workshop attendees will be equipped to:

1. Survey plant species with poor population data (especially critically endangered and endangered flora).
2. Record new threatened species populations (especially on recently acquired protected areas, many of which are under-surveyed).
3. Provide information on plant populations that can be used to improve/refine actions in Recovery Action Plans.

The workshops will involve an initial 2-hour session providing an overview of threatened plant species in Queensland and covering such topics as establishing a species profile, survey tools, permits to collect specimens, key information to collect in the field, threatened plant survey proforma, collecting herbarium voucher specimens and standard threatened flora survey techniques (as per Queensland Herbarium guidelines). The remainder of the day will be spent in the field demonstrating and conducting a real-life threatened flora survey so participants gain practical experience implementing the survey techniques.

* The QTPN was launched in 2024 to facilitate a collaborative approach to threatened plant recovery in Queensland. Contact QTPN Project Manager Paul Donatiu for more information.

Banner image: Participants at a Flora Survey Training Workshop in the Capricornia region in the field, identifying and recording an unnamed Comesperma species in the Canoona region. Credit: Paul Donatiu

Thank you to Bank Australia for supporting this project. Read more about their 2,117 hectare conservation reserve in Western Victoria, which is home to 251 native plant and 283 native animal species, and protects significant Mallee and Wimmera ecosystems.