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Website helps discover Wheatbelt flora and fauna

People living in the Wheatbelt now have a website they can use to help identify their local flora and fauna.

The online catalogue of native species will help everyone, from schoolchildren to landowners, to put a name to unusual insects, flowers or animals they may find.

Natural resource management group Wheatbelt NRM has developed the site.

The group’s CEO Natarsha Woods said that the online catalogue comprised almost two decades of information on biodiversity in the Wheatbelt.

”This online encyclopaedia of our local habitat helps to identify species from the Arid Bronze Azure Butterfly to the Shield-backed Trapdoor Spider,” Natarsha Woods said.

“The more well-known species such as Carnaby’s Black Cockatoo may be easier to recognise, but the lesser known Woylie, Heath Mouse and Carter’s Freshwater Mussel are harder to identify.

With many farmers now sitting on tractors and well into seeding, now would be a great time to check out our website.

We’re hoping people use this resource and raise the profile of some of these endangered and threatened species found in our backyards.”

Natarsha Woods said that the site also connected communities with the latest grants, subsidies, research projects and events surrounding natural resource management and sustainable farming.

The project has been funded through the Australian Government’s National Landcare Program and can be found at www.wheatbeltnrm.org.au