Life Sciences Commons^™

Conserving Australia's Unique Rainforest Fruits And Wild Relatives, Kim N Hamilton, Catherine A Offord, Peter Cuneo, Sarah E Ashmore, Myrna Deseo

Dr Myrna A Deseo

Australian rainforests have many unique edible fruits including wild relatives of worldwide economically important species such as citrus and macadamia. One of the key risks of projected climate change is its effect on Eastern Australian rainforests. The interaction of climate change with other threats, such as weeds and habitat fragmentation, is thus likely to impact on already vulnerable environments such as the World Heritage listed Gondwana Rainforests of S. Queensland and N. New South Wales. Seed banking is a cost effective way of conserving unique and vulnerable diversity ex situ for utilisation (e.g., plant breeding and restoration programs). However, the …