Wildlife corridors, while enhancing the aesthetic value of landscapes also contribute to the conservation of biodiversity by enabling species to move across the landscape to feed, breed, disperse and colonise.

The Corridor will be a living green link between the Far North Queensland resort city of Cairns and the southern coastal town of Cardwell, where World Heritage listed rainforest habitat has been fragmented by farms, tourism resorts and urban developments.

Although it is often called the Cassowary Corridor, cassowaries are not the Foundation's only concern. The Foundation aims to protect and rehabilitate habitat for all rainforest wildlife. Cassowaries are a good indicator species to focus on - if we can protect them, we'll also be protecting a range of other species that share their habitat.

Our unique Big Bird

The southern cassowary is the world’s third largest bird. It is one of Australia’s largest land animals and plays a unique role in the ecology of the World Heritage listed rainforests of tropical Australia

Cassowaries are ratites, flightless birds closely related to the emu, ostrich, kiwi and some extinct species. The Australian sub species is the Southern Cassowary, found in three populations onAustralia’s of Far North Queensland coast. The most vulnerable, is located on the wet tropical rainforest coastal strip between the cities of Townsville and Cooktown.

Both the Australian Government’s Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and the State of Queensland’s Nature Conservation (Wildlife) Regulation 1994 list the Southern Cassowary as an endangered species. Scientists believe only 1200 – 1500 cassowaries survive in the wild in Australia, this is comparable with the number of Giant Pandas in China.

Endangered but still threatened:

• These guardians of the rainforest are still threatened by habitat loss, road deaths and attacks by dogs.

• More than 80% of its prime habitat, coastal lowland rainforest, has been cleared over the last 100 years.

• Nearly a quarter of the remaining cassowary habitat has poor conservation protection.

• In the Mission Beach area alone cassowaries have  lost 42% of their critical habitat
in the past ten years.

• Links between the remaining patches of rainforest are essential if the cassowary is to survive.

How you can help

Help us raise funds

We need to secure cassowary habitat now - replant cassowary fruit trees and to operate our cassowary hospital.

Your contribution will provide funds for:

All contributions are tax deductible (in Australia and the USA)

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