Hickleton Station Forest Regeneration

Hickleton Station Forest Regeneration is a Human-Induced Regeneration project located in the Longreach region, approximately 115km west-south-west of the town of Longreach in Central West Queensland. It was registered in October 2015 and covers an extensive area of 15,724.40 hectares.

Human-Induced Regeneration (HIR) projects involve regenerating native forests by changing land management practices, such as managing the timing and extent of grazing, to allow native vegetation to reach forest cover. The standard requirement for these forests is to eventually achieve at least 20% canopy cover and a minimum height of 2 metres.

The Longreach area is predominantly used for extensive cattle and sheep grazing operations across large pastoral leases. The environment is classified as semi-arid with low, highly variable rainfall. Soils in this region generally consist of cracking clays found on Mitchell grass downs, alongside red sandy loams in the mulga woodlands.

This project establishes permanent native forests through assisted regeneration from in-situ seed sources (including rootstock and lignotubers) on land that was previously cleared and where regrowth was suppressed for at least 10 years prior to commencement. The project is managed by David Colin Quinn and Raymond John Quinn. Notably, they successfully fulfilled their original Carbon Abatement Contract (CAC102462) in October 2024, delivering 88,647 ACCUs to the Commonwealth. Additionally, Hickleton Station was featured as a studied site in a 2024 scientific paper analyzing woody vegetation cover changes across Australian HIR projects.