Botanists have embarked on a mountaintop rescue mission in far north Queensland's Wet Tropics World Heritage Area to collect and record plant species at risk from climate change.

Key points: Climate modelling suggests the habitat of endemic plant species in the Wet Tropics will drastically decline within as little as 15 years

Climate modelling suggests the habitat of endemic plant species in the Wet Tropics will drastically decline within as little as 15 years Target species including tiny orchids and native rhododendrons will be collected and propagated in botanic gardens

Target species including tiny orchids and native rhododendrons will be collected and propagated in botanic gardens Attempts will be made to build a seed bank of the plant species so there is a back-up collection of seeds

The mountain ranges of the far north are home to about 70 endemic species that rely on cooler climates at 1,000 metres above sea level.

Australian Tropical Herbarium director Professor Darren Crayn said climate modelling suggested their habitat would decline drastically.

Professor Darren Crayn is leading the five-year mountaintop rescue mission. ( ABC Far North: Brendan Mounter )

"Climate modelling now predicts drastic habitat loss from the highlands within as little as 15 years, with droughts being longer, hotter, drier and more frequent," Professor Crayn said.

"Lowland species might be able to migrate to favourable niches elsewhere, but these mountaintop species may already be at their limits.

"They can't go up as the climate warms — they're running out of space and they're running out of time."

Over the next five years scientists, together with Western Yalinji Indigenous rangers, will collect target species including tiny orchids, huge trees and Australia's only native rhododendrons from Mount Lewis, near Mossman.

The species will be distributed to subtropical and cool-climate botanic gardens in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, where they will be propagated in conservation collections and used in research and education.

Mount Lewis's endemic plant species rely on the cooler climates 1,000m above sea level. ( ABC Far North: Brendan Mounter )

"The aim is to secure the most severely threatened tropical mountaintop species in well-managed, living collections with microclimates as close as possible to their original habitat," Professor Crayn said.

Royal Botanic Gardens scientific officer Dr Karen Sommerville said once the plants were safely cultivated, experimental work would assess the physical limitations of the species, while the Australian PlantBank would attempt to build a seed bank of the species.

"We'll test them to see if they'll tolerate drying and … we'll test them to tolerate freezing," Dr Sommerville said.

"If they do, we can store them in the seed bank and we can have a back-up collection of those seeds.

"It's an insurance program to guard against extinction of the species.

If the plants tolerate drying and freezing they will be stored in a seed bank. ( ABC Far North: Brendan Mounter )

"If the species happen to disappear on the tropical mountaintops then we'll at least have a back-up collection that we can have to maintain them in botanic gardens if nowhere else."

Australian National Botanic Gardens seed biologist Dr Lydia Guja said the job of ensuring the survival of the tropical seeds and plants remained a challenge.

"There hasn't been a lot of research on how to keep the seeds of these species alive in conservation," Dr Guja said.

"Due to their origins high in the mountains, the seeds may not survive the processes of drying and freezing that are typically used in seed banking.

"Once we've found ways to conserve these seeds, we'll look at germination requirements to better understand what impact climate change might have on their germination.

"If we can understand the capacity of these seeds and plants to germinate and grow under a broad range of conditions we will know what we need to do to grow back-up plants for future generations."

The Wet Tropics are World Heritage-listed for their natural heritage values. ( ABC Far North: Brendan Mounter )

The Wet Tropics of far north Queensland were inscribed on the World Heritage Register in 1988, due to the region's immense natural heritage values.

"These mountaintop ecosystems are unique, not just nationally but globally; many of the species, both plants and animals, are found nowhere else on Earth," said Dr Sandra Abell, Wet Tropics Management Authority principal scientist.

"The best conservation outcome is to protect species in their original habitat but the modelling tells us we're unlikely to have that option.

"So, this is Plan B: act now to secure the most diverse 'captive' collection we can," she said.

The five-year project is funded by a $500,000 grant from the Ian Potter Foundation and $50,000 from the Wet Tropics Management Authority.