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Welcome to 

Fire Ecology and

Biodiversity


School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences | Faculty of Science

University of Melbourne

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One size doesn't fit all for conserving our iconic kangaroos

15/3/2021

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This story by Holly Sitters was originally published in Pursuit. It features results from our new paper showing that land managers can help conserve kangaroos by providing a mix of fire histories within large expanses of native vegetation. 

Find out more here: Delaney, L., Di Stefano, J. & Sitters, H. (2021). Mammal responses to spatial pattern in fire history depend on landscape context. Landscape Ecology. 36(3): 897-914.
While kangaroos are easier to spot than many of Australia’s more secretive native species, a suite of threats currently face these magnificent animals.  The 2019-20 fire season was exceptional because, according to modern records, it consumed forests that had never before burnt at such vast scales.

More than 200,000 kangaroos are thought to have died during or soon after the fires in Victoria, where paradoxically, permits have been issued to kill almost 450,000 kangaroos since 2018. At that time, the state’s total population was estimated to be 1.4 million.

Although these figures are alarming, this is not another grim conservation tale.  This year, La Niña climate patterns have brought Victoria’s wildlife and fire crews some respite in the form of summer rain and cooler daytime temperatures. And the Victorian Government’s Department of Environment Land, Water and Planning has among the most sophisticated approaches to ecological fire management in the world, having forged partnerships with researchers and community groups over recent decades.

My team, including co-researchers Lauren Delaney and Dr Julian Di Stefano, works with land managers in Victoria and South Australia to find out where and when to apply planned fire for the benefit of kangaroos and other animals.  Our new research has found that kangaroos prefer a mix of long-unburnt and recently burnt areas within large expanses of woodland or forest.  It’s likely that kangaroos enjoy the shelter provided by shrubs and large trees in long-unburnt vegetation, alongside fresh, green ephemeral foods in recently burnt areas. 

However, the kangaroos’ preferences changed where remnant patches of vegetation were surrounded by pasture, crops or small towns.  In fragmented landscapes, kangaroos did not prefer a mix of fire ages, presumably because they substituted pasture grasses for post-fire ephemerals.  We found consistent patterns in four species: eastern grey kangaroo (Macropus giganteus), western grey kangaroo (Macropus fuliginosus), red-necked wallaby (Notamacropus rufogriseus) and - to our surprise - the yellow-footed antechinus (Antechinus flavipes), a 45-gram shrew-like marsupial.

The yellow-footed antechinus is famed for its unusual sexual exploits, involving the death of all males following an annual winter mating season. After the males die, pregnant females must search for a suitable den in a tree hollow or log where they rear their young.  Fire may cause a shortage of these den sites if it consumes big, old trees which provide lots of hollows. While females are fairly sedentary, a radio-tracking study showed that males live their short lives to the full and may leave the relative safety of native woodland to find food in nearby pasture.

Nonetheless, it was harder to wrap our heads around the notion that the dainty antechinus would venture into paddocks more often than the much larger and more mobile kangaroos and wallabies – but our results indicate that the four species share an ability to take advantage of a range of resources.

We used wildlife cameras to survey the animals on Gunditjmara Country in the heathy woodland of a quiet corner of southwest Victoria, where remnant vegetation is surrounded by pasture, pine and blue gum plantations.  Using a sprawling and dilapidated house in Casterton as a base for our fieldwork, we visited 70 sites and tied cameras near the base of two trees per site. The cameras are triggered automatically by motion and heat, and we placed a smelly bait mix of oats, peanut butter and golden syrup in front of the camera to encourage animals to hang out long enough for us to identify them with confidence.

After 25 days, we returned to pick up the cameras and celebrate our haul of tens of thousands of animal images.
For animals like koalas and echidnas, identification is easy – but Gunditjmara Country features several mammals that are very difficult to distinguish from one another.  Eastern and western grey kangaroos may look identical to the untrained eye, but with practice and help from kangaroo experts we gradually picked up the subtle differences in ear shape and fur colour.

We hope that the outcomes of the many days we spent scratching our heads while looking at grainy images will help land managers decide where and when to use planned fire (or fire suppression) to benefit kangaroos and other less-well-known species.  Although two kangaroos, the wallaby, and the antechinus are not currently listed as threatened or endangered, increasingly frequent wildfires, together with increases in the numbers of kangaroos that can be killed for commercial profit, are likely to be having dramatic impacts on population sizes.

Biodiversity conservation during this time of rapid environmental change can sometimes feel like trying to hold back a tsunami with the palm of your hand.  However, tailoring ecological fire management strategies according to whether native vegetation occurs as a large, continuous block or in fragmented remnants may help preserve one of Australia’s iconic species for generations to come.


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Obstacles and successes in the Adelaide Mount Lofty Ranges

21/7/2020

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While a large team has worked in the Casterton region as part of the Fire & Fragmentation Project, Simeon has been going it alone on a closely-related project in the Adelaide Mount Lofty Ranges. 

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As the name suggests, the hills are precipitous and the human population is much larger than it is in the forgotten corners of southwest Victoria and southeast South Australia.  Simeon has contended with bushfires and equipment theft (not to mention coronavirus!), but has recently achieved the great feat of tagging hundreds of thousands of camera-trap photos single-handedly!


​As of last week, I have finished going through the vast numbers of images from my camera traps that I set between last October and March, and extracted all the data about what species were detected at each of my 129 sites (this is 3 less than I had previously, due to the Cudlee Creek fire and several missing cameras). 

Across both of my fieldwork seasons I have detected southern brown bandicoots (shown above) at 23 sites, mostly in Cleland, Belair, and Scott Creek/Mount Bold.  I’m currently starting to look at how the surrounding landscape, in terms of land use and past fire, might shape mammal community composition at each site. Early work suggests that more fragmented areas are more likely to be home to feral and disturbance-specialist species (e.g. black rats, kangaroos, brushtail possums), while more intact areas are where habitat specialists like native bush rats, bandicoots and antechinus are found.

I plan to look at how the fire mosaic affects mammal communities, and whether the influence of fire is dependent on habitat fragmentation or vice versa.  I hope to have my first chapter answering these questions completed in the next 3-4 months, before moving on to looking at individual species and habitat structure.

​Having successfully trialled the use of hair traps for collecting DNA from bandicoots (above left) my plans had a covid-shaped spanner thrown in the works. I’m still figuring out exactly what that portion of the project will look like, but I still plan to look at bandicoot habitat connectivity in some way.
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Tune in for Amy's and Saumya's PhD confirmation seminars on Friday 10 May

9/5/2019

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Please come along to Amy's and Saumya's PhD confirmation seminars to hear about their plans to better understand how landscape structure, fire and resource availability influence ground-dwelling mammal population persistence.

Join person or via Zoom.

Where:  Small Lecture Theatre, Room 123, Uni Building, Creswick
When:  10.30-11.30 am, Friday 10 May

Both their projects involve measurement of vegetation structure in the beautiful heathy woodland of western Victoria and eastern South Australia.  If you'd like to volunteer to help with data collection between July and October, please get in touch!
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Tune in for Simeon Zylinski's PhD confirmation seminar on Friday 1 March

26/2/2019

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Please come along to Simeon's PhD confirmation seminar to hear about his plans to disentangle the effects of fire and landscape structure on mammal communities. 

Join person or via Zoom.

Where:  Small Lecture Theatre, Room 123, Uni Building, Creswick
When:  10 am, Friday 1 March

Simeon's project involves camera trapping and collection of bandicoot DNA samples.  If you'd like to volunteer to help with data collection in the spectacular Mount Lofty Ranges between March and May, please get in touch!
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The 2018-19 fieldwork season kicks off with mixed results

26/11/2018

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A multi-faceted team of reptile, mammal and bat-trappers recently headed out west for a week of fieldwork highs, disappointments and everything in between. 

In terms of animal numbers, Taylor and Holly's sites were most bountiful, with 35 reptiles falling into pitfall or funnel traps.  Microbats appeared in Amanda's harp traps in dribs and drabs until she hit a bumper night of 19 animals, resulting in 25 for the week.  A very promising start to the season although microbat ID makes peering at skink scales seem terribly straight forward.

One thousand two hundred and fifty Elliott-trap nights yielded one very special Yellow-footed Antechinus plus two mildly confused Shinglebacks.  We are hopeful that Amy, Rachel, Saumya and Julian's mammoth efforts will be rewarded soon, and that the low trap success reflects the time of year.  Kelvin experienced similarly low animal numbers this time last year, and Rachel had heath mice coming out of her ears during her pilot study in March.

We're currently seeking volunteers for our programme of almost back-to-back trapping over the next few months.  Food, basic accommodation, and transport from Ballarat or Creswick are provided.  Please let us know if you're interested, and keep an eye on the facebook page for details of specific trips.
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Please join us in Casterton for our information day!

10/7/2018

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Fire & Fragmentation Project Information Day

Casterton Town Hall, 67 Henty Street
Tuesday 7 August, 10:30-15:30
Morning tea and lunch provided
Our Information Day will be an opportunity to:
  • hear about our current work and plans, and
  • discuss priorities for fire research, conservation and management in the region and further afield.

Find a provisional program below, and please RSVP by Monday 30 July.

We look forward to seeing you!
Click here to rsvp
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News from the front

8/3/2018

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(The fieldwork front)

A team of reptile trappers and vegetation measurers has made Casterton its second home over the past couple of months. 


This work forms part of Annalie and Sarah's PhD projects, and Kelvin's Masters project.  Their missions are fairly ambitious and they've been assisted by Zahlia, Holly, Julian and Matt, as well as a crew of fantastic volunteers.

Please enjoy a selection of their favourite photos, and don't hesitate to get in touch via facebook if you're interested in helping.


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Reptile-trapping gets off to a cracking start

16/11/2017

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Annalie, Sarah, Holly, Julian and Matt caught more animals than in their wildest dreams during their inaugural reptile-trapping trip last week.

They used six funnel traps and six pitfall traps at each of 10 sites in the Drajurk and Roseneath State Forests near Casterton in western Victoria. 
They were treated to visits from the Eastern three-lined Skink (Bassiana duperreye - a particularly trap-happy species), South-eastern Slider (Lerista bougainvillii), Jacky Dragon (Amphibolurus muricatus), Striped Worm-lizard (Aprasia striolata), Common Garden Skink (Lampropholis guitchenoti), Southern Grass Skink (Pseudemoia entrecasteauxii), and Obscure Skink (Morethia obscura).

The work forms part of Annalie and Sarah's PhD projects. Annalie is examining the responses of reptile communities to spatial pattern in fire history, and is also interested in comparing the efficacy of trapping methods. Sarah is exploring the combined effects of fire and fragmentation on species' movement capacities with a view to finding out how managers can apply fire to enhance species' connectivity and persistence.

Between trap checks we found time to admire the swathes of Xanthorrhoea australis, which is flowering spectacularly. Kelvin plans to measure the shape and distribution of X. australis as part of his studies of small mammal habitat associations, so we also spent a while pondering alternative methods.

Many months of trapping lie ahead (10 sites down, 130 to go), but it was a promising start.

Please visit the Fire & Fragmentation Project page for more information about this research.

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Non-reptilian highlights included a Silky Mouse (Pseudomys apodemoides)
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Before heading home we deployed six camera traps at each site.
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Eastern Shinglebacks (Tiliqua rugosa), aka Sleepy Lizards, were hanging out everywhere except the traps.
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New PhD opportunity with our research group

12/7/2017

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We're offering an exciting PhD opportunity within the Fire & Fragmentation Project.  The aim of project will be to determine the arrangement of fires that maximises habitat suitability, movement capacity and gene flow for mammals or invertebrates in a fragmented landscape.
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Please find further information here. 

The project will run between 2018 and 2021 and is based at the University of Melbourne's Creswick campus.  We are committed to supporting PhD students by providing:
  • an experienced supervisory team
  • a collaborative research environment
  • fieldwork support
  • project operating expenses
  • computing resources
  • a top-up scholarship of $24,500 ($7,000/year for 3.5 years) 

Applicants should send a written expression of interest, including CV and statement of results, to Holly by 25 September 2017.  Holly can also be contacted with any enquiries.
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Is the Fire & Fragmentation Project honeymoon period over?

31/5/2017

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Evidence for

Evidence against

Having carefully balanced the evidence, we conclude that the honeymoon period lives on.

Last week the Fire & Fragmentation Project team ventured out to the heathy woodland between Dartmoor and Edenhope to set up their second round of camera traps.  This work is part of Zahlia and Lauren's studies into the effects of fire and fragmentation on mammals.  They are currently going through the photos from their first round of camera trapping, and will compile their favourites soon.  Please stay tuned.

Thanks to Sarah, Lauren and Zahlia for providing all the evidence.
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Where to find us

University of Melbourne
4 Water Street
Creswick
Victoria 3363

Phone +61 (0)3 5321 4300 or email us

Photos contributed by Holly Sitters, Bronwyn Hradsky, students of the Fire Ecology and Biodiversity Group, and remote cameras.
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