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Wildlife Research and Management
staff
formerly worked for CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems. Their past projects include:
§ Historical ecology –
the historical trends in loss of fauna in the early years of European
settlement in Australia. This work has utilized the unpublished
notes of key animal collectors from the early 20th century and those of a
long-time resident of pastoral Western
Australia.
For more information see the Historical Ecology fact
sheet (pdf);
§ Island ecology –
the distribution, abundance, and ecology of mammals on islands. This work details the surveys of
threatened native mammals on Bernier, Dorre, Barrow and Boodie Islands
in the period 1988 - 1992. For more
information see the Island
Refuges fact sheet (pdf);
§ Predator control –
effective predator control to protect native mammals. Introduced predators (the red fox and the
feral cat) have played a pivotal role in the demise of much of the
medium-sized Australian mammal fauna from southern Australia. While there are examples of wide-scale
control of foxes, the control of feral cats remains problematic. Cats have been eliminated from some
islands and excluded from large fenced areas to allow the re-establishment
of native mammals. For more information
on progress with control techniques see the Feral Cats – impact and control
fact sheet (pdf);
§ Reintroduction of
threatened mammals – the restoration of Australia’s ‘lost’ fauna. Dr Jeff Short and his staff have worked
with the Useless Loop community over 15 years to develop one of Australia’s
most successful and enduring projects to re-establish native mammals. This project pioneered the use of fenced
peninsulas for conservation and was one of the first to use an in situ ‘safe haven’ to ensure the
long-term success of the reintroduction.
See the overview of
this project and detailed profiles of reintroduced species (burrowing bettong, western barred bandicoot and
greater
stick-nest rat).
§ Landscape ecology –
conservation of biodiversity in fragmented agricultural landscapes. One approach to landscape modification to
meet the needs of resident biodiversity is to redesign the landscape to
meet the needs of the most threatened species – the ‘focal species’. This approach has been advocated in the
agricultural landscapes of eastern and Western Australia. A critical evaluation of this technique
is available as a report to Land and Water Australia (Focal Species - evaluation
pdf).
§ Landscape ecology –
the role of poison plants (Gastrolobium
spp.) in buffering native mammals from decline. See report to the National Geographic (Poison plant pdf).
For a complete list of Dr Jeff Short’s
publications (pdf) click here.
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