Science for Saving Species Research findings factsheet Project 3.1 Factsheet: A Threatened Plant Index for Western Australia Research in brief Background This project has developed a Nearly 1,400 plant species or and for different functional groups Threatened Species Index (TSX) subspecies are listed as threatened and management categories). for Australia to assist policymakers, or extinct in Australia. Monitoring Assembling all of the data is a big job conservation managers and the of these species plays a critical role and is being staged. Data and trends public to better understand how in assessing how populations are for threatened birds and mammals population trends across Australia’s changing over time, and helps to were released in 2018 and 2019, threatened species are changing identify where management respectively. In 2020, data and trends over time. actions are and are not working. for threatened plants have been For the first time in Australia, Hundreds of threatened species added, and the trends for birds the Threatened Plant Index has have been monitored over the years and mammals have been updated. combined data from multiple and across the country by dozens The TSX allows Australian programs to tell us how Australia’s of different government and non- governments, non-government threatened plant species are faring government and community groups, organisations, stakeholders and the through time, and which plant but previously there was no way to community to better understand groups and regions most need help. bring all of these data together to and report on how large groups of show us the bigger picture about People can examine the trends, threatened species are changing how different groups of species compare the results of different over time. It will also potentially across different regions are functional groups, regions, or enable us to better understand the management categories, and faring over time. performance of high-level strategies explore the underlying data Australia’s Threatened Species Index and the return on investment in through the TSX web-app. (TSX) is based on the Living Planet threatened species recovery efforts. Index, a method developed by World Darwinia wittwerorum. More data (and species) will be Wildlife Fund and the Zoological Image: Andrew Crawford added to the index as they become Society of London. The method available each year, increasing the enables trends from different species representativeness and robustness to be aggregated together at a of the findings. national scale, as well as at other levels (e.g. for each state and territory, A Threatened Species Index for plants in Western Australia Here, for the first time, we present Anyone monitoring threatened plant 3. Sites with no (known) targeted the Threatened Plant Index for populations in a systematic way management (Figure 4) Western Australia, which combines can upload data via a data provision The index itself shows the average monitoring data on threatened template on the TSX portal. Data that change in the population size of species populations from across meet the suitability criteria will be threatened plant taxa compared to the state (Figure 1A). added to the next iteration of the index. a baseline year. This baseline year The index includes data for taxa For some sites and taxa, data of 1995 was chosen for the national (meaning species and subspecies) custodians have also provided index because very few of the ongoing that are Near Threatened, Vulnerable, information on whether the site/taxa monitoring programs originated Endangered or Critically Endangered has received targeted conservation before 1995. For Western Australia, under Australian legislation (EPBC Act) or management action. For plants, the baseline year has been set to 2000. and/or internationally (on the IUCN this allows us to also look at trends The baseline year has an index Red List as of March 2020). for these sub-groups: value of 1. Changes in the index These data come from monitoring 1. Sites subject to any management are proportional—a year with a TPX programs where plant populations (e.g. herbivore control, weed value of 0.5 indicates that on average have been surveyed at the same place management, pest or disease the population size of each taxa in multiple years with a standardised control, translocations) (Figure 2), has decreased to half the size they method; this makes it possible to 2. Populations that include were during the baseline year; a TPX detect changes over time. translocated individuals value of 1.5 indicates that on average (Figure 3), and population sizes are 50% above the baseline year. Key findings: Western Australian threatened plant trends In this first iteration the Threatened While the overall index value in 2017 representative sample of all threatened Plant Index for Western Australia is 0.25, the grey cloud around it species in Western Australia. includes 24 taxa. You can find a represents variability in the trends of The Western Australian index for summary of the species included by individual species that make up the threatened plants at sites that were clicking “Data summary” on the overall multi-species index (Figure 1A). subject to any management such TSX visualisation tool. It is created by randomly sampling as herbivore control, weed species trends from all possible The overall TPX value for WA in management, pest or disease control, trends in the dataset 100 times, and 2017 is 0.25. This means that on or translocations, has 18 time series dropping the 5 trends that are furthest average the size of threatened plant with data on 11 plant taxa. This index from the average, resulting in a 95% populations in our dataset have has a 2017 value of 0.45, which “confidence limit”. decreased by 75% between corresponds to a decrease of 55% 2000 and 2017 (Figure 1). Note that the species included between 2000 and 2017 (Figure 2). in the index are not necessarily a The index for populations that include translocated plants is based on 7 time series and 3 plant taxa. This index has a 2017 value of 0.70, which corresponds to an average decrease of 30% between 2000 and 2017 (Figure 3). The index for sites with no (known) targeted management is based on 29 time series and 18 plant taxa. The TPX value in 2017 is 0.14, which corresponds to an 86% decrease on average in relative plant abundance Adenanthos ellipticus. between 2000 and 2017 (Figure 4). Image: Sarah Barrett What should we know about the data? The Western Australian TPX is based on 2017 inclusive, were used for index particularly in regional gaps and for 47 time series (defined as sites where calculation. Sub-trends of the overall poorly represented plant groups would data on taxa are recorded using the trend (e.g. for plant functional groups strengthen the representativeness of same methodology and a consistent and management categories) can the index. Nonetheless, it is worth monitoring effort though time) across be calculated if data on at least noting that in WA, >90% of threatened 24 taxa, all of which were received from three taxa are available. flora are located in the South West the WA Department of Biodiversity, The index currently contains more Australian Floristic Region. Conservation and Attractions. Data data from the south western area quality was maximised by 1) checking Ongoing long-term monitoring of the state, where approximately whether each dataset had been programs allow for continuing 90% of the State’s threatened flora produced by standardised monitoring capability to track changes in the occur (Figure 1B). and 2) by sending surveys to custodians relative abundance (and occurrence) and requesting that they assess the The number of monitored sites of threatened and near-threatened trends produced for their datasets. and taxa that met the TPX criteria plant species. (Figure 1C) has substantially Only time series produced from Monitoring data is available for a increased since 2000 (Figure 1D). standardised monitoring programs smaller proportion of threatened plants and with a minimum length of two Increasing the number of species, compared with threatened birds or years, collected between 2000 and regions and plant groups monitored, mammals (view the 2020 index). A 24 taxa B 47 time series C D Figure 1: A) The The Western Australian Threatened Plant Index (TPX) based on all data provided on threatened and near-threatened plants. The blue line shows the change in plant abundance relative to the baseline year of 2000, where the index is set to 1.0. The grey cloud shows the confidence limit. B) A map showing where threatened plant data were recorded in Western Australia. The red dots indicate repeatedly monitored fixed sites. C) This dot plot shows the years for which monitoring data were available to compile the index. Each row represents a time series where a species was monitored with a consistent method at a single site in Western Australia. D) The number of species (in black circles) and number of time series (in blue diamonds) used to calculate the Western Australian index for each year. A 11 taxa B 18 time series C D Figure 2: A) The Western Australian Threatened Plant Index (TPX) based only on data from managed sites (including herbivore control, weed management, pest or disease control, or translocations and other dedicated conservation management). B) A map showing where threatened and near-threatened plant taxa on sites subject to any conservation management were recorded in Western Australia. C) This dot plot shows the years for which monitoring data were available to compile the index. Each row represents a time series where a species was monitored with a consistent method at a single site in Western Australia. D) The number of species (in black circles) and number of time series (in blue diamonds) used to calculate the Western Australian index for each year.