IMAGINE a narrow, man-made desert a million kilometres long with a huge number of environments coming and going on both sides. Nothing lives on this desert and creatures enter it at their peril. In Australia there are nearly a million kilometres of made and unmade roads.
Mitchell Shire manages about 1,200 kilometres. A roadway includes the road itself, its verges and associated reserves out to the fences of private land. A single carriageway is about 7.5 metres wide. The verge can be a few metres on both sides and the entire roadway can often be 50 metres wide. Where roads converge with other roads, railways and waterways, the reserve can be many hectares in area.
During construction a zone consisting of the road proper and the verge is cleared and landscaped to keep runoff from returning to the road. In this profoundly disturbed verge, life almost begins anew amongst the bare soil, rocks, concrete and excess water. Domestic animals are fenced out and it becomes an environment visited occasionally for slashing and pruning, poisoning of weeds and the occasional fire. All the time cars go whizzing past.
Some of these roadside zones are well over 150 years old and quite mature as unique environments. Depending on the width of the roadside reserve, these areas can be the only places with original native flora and fauna after surrounding areas have been cleared for farming. These environments are recognised and many protected. Mitchell Shire maintains a long list of wildlife corridors and endangered flora and fauna in their Rural Roadside Environmental Management Plan.
Roadside discoveries of rare plants like the Moon Orchid and Yellow Gums are regularly reported. Rare animals, too, such as the Western Swamp Tortoise, Northern Hairy Nosed Wombat and Leadbeater’s Possum find sanctuary along with birds like the Eastern Curlew and Gouldian Finch. Even threatened insects like the pink grasshopper thrive roadside on native grasses.
Flow from the runoff makes dirt and gravel accumulate in shallow depressions where reptiles lay eggs. It is a bit risky to hatch next to a road but the warm moist gravel is a good place to incubate. 100 million kangaroos, wombats, echidnas, snakes and lizards, birds and uncounted billions (my estimate) of insects die on our roads. They are a very risky environment for people, too. Drive carefully on our tracks and roads.
