Rainforest Rescue Rainforest Replanting Project #1

This site forms part of the Daintree Oxbow, a larger restoration project covering approximately 740 hectares. The objective is to mitigate threats and restore rainforest biodiversity on land formerly cleared for agriculture, between two Wet Tropics World Heritage areas.

The site sits within a catchment connected to the Daintree River and ultimately, the Great Barrier Reef lagoon. Replacing fallow field with vegetated rainforest reduces the sediment and nutrient runoff tracked under the Reef 2050 Water Quality Improvement Plan supporting increased beneficial outcomes for the river and reef. Restoring habitat structure also reconnects fragmented rainforest for the endangered southern cassowary and other threatened, rainforest dependent species that rely on connected habitat to move, feed and breed.

The Oxbow supports several nationally listed species such as, but not limited to, the Southern Cassowary and the Spectacled Flying Fox, both nationally listed Endangered. The site is also unique in its landscape connections: it centres on McDowell Swamp, the only oxbow lagoon in the lower Daintree, linking rainforest, mangroves and river systems on former sugarcane land, between two Wet Tropics World Heritage areas and adjacent to the Great Barrier Reef catchment.

The Project has been approved to stack with Australian Carbon Credit Units under the Methodology for Reforestation by Mallee or Environmental Planting. For further information on this project – Projects | Clean Energy Regulator.