Tasmania - CRA/RFA - Forests - National Estate - Refugia from Present Processes

Contemporary refugia contain communities that are strongly associated with climatic and topographic factors that confer a degree of protection from endangering processes such as fire and disease. These refugia have two important roles: they provide locations for the conservation of species and communities and they provide sources for population expansion if limiting conditions abate.

Places qualifying as refuges from frequent fire do so because, although they contain plants sensitive to fire, they are protected in the landscape by climatic, topographic and soil features. It is generally accepted, however, that very few, if any, places have totally escaped the effects of fire in Tasmania and that refugia will have occasionally been burnt under extreme fire conditions. But such events are considered much rarer in these places in comparison with areas that lack the protection afforded by refugia. It is the low frequency of burning that marks these places as significant.

After wildfire, forest communities associated with refugia are usually slower to recover and may take many decades, even centuries, to do so.

This database is a digital polygon coverage of Tasmania (captured at 1:100 000 scale). Refugia from present processes are coded with a unique number and the relevant National Estate values and criteria.

All sites in this coverage are classified according to National Estate criterion A2: Importance in maintaining existing processes or natural systems at the regional or national scale.

This is an archived dataset jointly owned by the Commonwealth and the Tasmanian Governments under the Tasmania-Commonwealth Regional Forest Agreement (RFA) data agreement of 8th November 1997.This data is available to the public under licence from the Department as part of the Commonwealth Spatial Data Access and Pricing Policy.

Any reproduction of this dataset must carry the following statement: Copyright Commonwealth of Australia and Tasmanian Government 1997. Departmental Deed