Thanks to the generous support provided to our Woodlands Protection program, Trust for Nature has been focussing its recent conservation efforts on protecting woodlands. In the last couple of months, the Trust has purchased two new woodland properties on the Gippsland Plains, totalling 162 ha, through the Revolving Fund. The purchase of these two properties establishes additional habitat links across the Gippsland Plains Conservation Management Network area and ensures the permanent protection of nationally endangered Gippsland Plains Grassy Woodland as part of the National Reserve system.

The Trust is also negotiating the permanent protection of two large patches of habitat in the Wimmera region to provide additional areas of secure habitat for the endangered Red-tailed Black-Cockatoo and other species of woodland wildlife.

In north eastern Victoria, staff in the Goulburn Broken and North East regions are currently assessing Box-Gum Grassy Woodland and Buloke Woodland sites for management and protection options as part of a large, partnership project funded through the Australian Governments Caring for our Country program.

Trust for Nature has also begun a new project in partnership with Birds Australia, Nature Conservation Trust of NSW and Tasmanian Land Conservancy to identify additional private land sites to protect with a conservation covenant and manage for woodland bird conservation. This project is being funded through the Australian Governments Caring for our Country program and runs until mid-2011.

Finally, as part of our State Government-funded project 'Farming with a Difference - protecting Victoria's woodland birds', Trust for Nature has so far protected more than 600 ha of woodland habitat in northwestern Victoria at a site supporting a range of declining and threatened species of Mallee woodland birds, including the Major Mitchell Cockatoo, the nationally threatened Regent Parrot and Crested Bellbird. The Farming with a Difference project has also enabled us to undertake critical conservation actions on existing covenants and properties to improve their habitat condition for woodland birds and begin establishing a long-term monitoring program for woodland birds across Victoria's woodlands.