ORCID Profile
0000-0002-0465-7849
Current Organisations
University of Technology Sydney
,
University of Queensland
,
Zoos Victoria
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Publisher: Wiley
Date: 13-03-2018
DOI: 10.1111/AEC.12595
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 13-09-2019
DOI: 10.1002/WSB.1012
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 20-10-2020
Publisher: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Date: 26-08-2017
DOI: 10.1101/181149
Abstract: The invasion of toxic cane toads ( Rhinella marina ) is a major threat to northern quolls ( Dasyurus hallucatus ) which are poisoned when they attack this novel prey item. Quolls are now endangered as a consequence of the toad invasion. Conditioned taste aversion can be used to train in idual quolls to avoid toads, but we currently lack a training technique that can be used at a landscape scale to buffer entire populations from toad impact. Broad scale deployment requires a bait that can be used for training, but there is no guarantee that such a bait will ultimately elicit aversion to toads. Here we test a manufactured bait—a ‘toad sausage’—for its ability to elicit aversion to toads in northern quolls. To do this, we exposed one group of quolls to a toad sausage and another to a control sausage and compared the quolls’ predatory responses when presented with a dead adult toad. Captive quolls that consumed a single toad sausage showed substantially reduced interest in cane toads, interacting with them for less than half the time of their untrained counterparts and showing substantially reduced attack behaviour. We also quantified bait uptake in the field, by both quolls and non-target species. These field trials showed that wild quolls were the most frequent species attracted to the baits, and that approximately 61% of quolls consumed toad-aversion baits when first encountered. Between 40-68% of these animals developed aversion to further bait consumption. Our results suggest that toad-aversion sausages can be used to train wild quolls to avoid cane toads. This opens the possibility for broad-scale quoll training with toad aversion sausages: a technique that may allow wildlife managers to prevent quoll extinctions at a landscape scale.
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 22-12-2023
DOI: 10.1002/EAP.2762
Abstract: Monitoring trends in animal populations in arid regions is challenging due to remoteness and low population densities. However, detecting species' tracks or signs is an effective survey technique for monitoring population trends across large spatial and temporal scales. In this study, we developed a simulation framework to evaluate the performance of alternative track‐based monitoring designs at detecting change in species distributions in arid Australia. We collated presence–absence records from 550 2‐ha track‐based plots for 11 vertebrates over 13 years and fitted ensemble species distribution models to predict occupancy in 2018. We simulated plausible changes in species' distributions over the next 15 years and, with estimates of detectability, simulated monitoring to evaluate the statistical power of three alternative monitoring scenarios: (1) where surveys were restricted to existing 2‐ha plots, (2) where surveys were optimized to target all species equally, and (3) where surveys were optimized to target two species of conservation concern. Across all monitoring designs and scenarios, we found that power was higher when detecting increasing occupancy trends compared to decreasing trends owing to the relatively low levels of initial occupancy. Our results suggest that surveying 200 of the existing plots annually (with a small subset resurveyed twice within a year) will have at least an 80% chance of detecting 30% declines in occupancy for four of the five invasive species modeled and one of the six native species. This increased to 10 of the 11 species assuming larger (50%) declines. When plots were positioned to target all species equally, power improved slightly for most compared to the existing survey network. When plots were positioned to target two species of conservation concern (crest‐tailed mulgara and dusky hopping mouse), power to detect 30% declines increased by 29% and 31% for these species, respectively, at the cost of reduced power for the remaining species. The effect of varying survey frequency depended on its trade‐off with the number of sites s led and requires further consideration. Nonetheless, our research suggests that track‐based surveying is an effective and logistically feasible approach to monitoring broad‐scale occupancy trends in desert species with both widespread and restricted distributions.
Location: Australia
No related grants have been discovered for Naomi Indigo.