Office of the Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment

Dr Ash Bunce has commenced as the new Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment and has been appointed for a five-year term.

The Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment plays an important advisory, reporting and oversight role to the ACT Government to protect the ACT’s environment and supports planning and development outcomes that are ecologically sustainable. Additionally, the Commissioner receives and responds to community concerns about environmental management in the ACT.

Dr Bunce is an experienced regulator and academic with experience delivering outcomes at both national and international levels in environmental protection, conservation, agriculture and biosecurity. He brings extensive experience leading industry transformation, complex stakeholder negotiations and best practice regulatory functions positioning him well to provide strong independent oversight for the protection of the environment and sustainable development in the ACT.

Botanic Gardens Week is coming up 🌿

This year’s theme, Where Your Health Grows, celebrates the powerful role botanic gardens play in supporting wellbeing. In a busy world full of noise and distraction, the Australian National Botanic Gardens offers a restorative space — somewhere to slow down, move gently, reconnect with nature, and share moments with others.

🌱 Botanic Gardens Week is an annual celebration highlighting how botanic gardens strengthen mental, physical and social wellbeing, while deepening our connection to the natural world. From peaceful paths and native plants to birds, fresh air and quiet places to pause — there’s something here for everyone to rest, reflect and revive.

🔗 Explore Botanic Gardens Week events: https://www.bganz.org.au/news-events/botanic-gardens-week/

"Globally, trees cut the urban heat island effect by almost 50%."

https://bit.ly/4ttvE9T

Urban trees cool the world’s cities more than we thought – but we can’t rely on them alone Cities around the world rely on trees to keep temperatures lower. New research shows trees are remarkably effective – but can’t do it all

🗺️ Explore the Canberra Tree Week Trail! 🌳

The Canberra Tree Week Trail invites you to explore a selection of significant and beautiful trees located across the city.

It’s a self guided experience you can enjoy at your own pace, with each tree offering a reason to pause, learn and look a little closer.

🍂 The trail is part of Canberra Tree Week (2–10 May), alongside guided walks, talks, family activities, art, poetry and wellbeing events across Canberra.

➡️ Plan your Tree Week exploration and see what’s on at https://www.act.gov.au/treeweek

Scientists confirmed that trees in forests actively share sugars, water, and nutrients through underground fungal networks — supporting weaker and younger trees during stress periods in a biological cooperation system operating entirely beneath the forest floor.

Researchers at the University of British Columbia mapped mycorrhizal fungal networks connecting 300-year-old Douglas fir trees across 25 hectares of old-growth forest in British Columbia. Carbon tracer experiments confirmed that sugars produced by large hub trees traveled through fungal filaments to shaded seedlings receiving insufficient sunlight for independent survival. Seedlings receiving underground support showed 25 percent higher survival rates during summer drought compared to seedlings with severed fungal connections.

The largest hub trees maintain connections to hundreds of neighboring trees simultaneously, prioritizing resource flow toward genetically related seedlings during scarcity periods. This discovery fundamentally changes how scientists understand forest resilience, suggesting forests function as interconnected communities rather than simple collections of competing individual organisms. Future forest management will need to account for these underground communication systems in conservation planning.

Source: University of British Columbia Forest Sciences, Canadian Forest Service, Nature Ecology, 2025

https://bit.ly/4eykIno

Alpine ash endangered listing 'will do nothing to protect them' Scientists hope an endangered listing may help preserve alpine ash forests, but the forestry industry is raising concerns that it could result in further decline.