An Australian organisation embracing global outreach as part of its wildlife conservation approach, Zoos Victoria is using its expertise to assist French Polynesian islands to protect rare and critically endangered local bird species. Zoos Victoria's international conservation manager, Chris Banks, reports on some heartening early successes.
In a method that has been called 'coral IVF' - referring to the successful human in-vitro fertilisation medical treatments - millions of coral 'babies' have been loaded into floating nurseries near Cairns for mass rearing.
Simin Maleknia is one of Australia's foremost experts on utilising odour detection methods and technologies to seek out criminal wildlife trafficking - and she can use those same technologies to return rescued wildlife to their correct regions. She is also an advocate for the 'right kinds' of wildlife tourism, for this industry is increasingly becoming recognised as an effective way to better protect wildlife in natural habitats. Recent prosecutions show that, properly designed and resourced, wildlife tourism can help to both detect and deter the illegal trafficking of collectible species. In this report, Simin Maleknia explains the role wildlife tourism, matched with detection and tracing techniques and technologies, is playing in stamping out this abhorrent trade that is pushing some endangered species to the brink. In Wildlife Australia's next edition, she goes into more detail on these new technologies and how they may be used to protect wildlife into the future.
Artificial lights have brightened the night in cities across the world and urban species may be in the process of adapting - but what really happens when, after 3.5 billion years of evolution, artificial light invades what should be relative darkness? University of Melbourne senior lecturer and group leader of its Urban Light Lab, Dr Ther sa Jones, explains what is really going on.
Ants can tell us a lot about how species interrelate and are interdependent in various environments. Fascinating new research from the Kronauer lab at Rockefeller University in the US is changing many preconceptions about the social systems of ants. Graduate fellow Vikram Chandra explains recent discoveries from the lab that suggest a molecular explanation for how ants first became social.
Catrin F. Williams, a Research Fellow at Cardiff University with multidisciplinary research interests ranging from pure microbiology to physicochemical techniques and microwave engineering, has long been fascinated by nature\u0027s bioluminescence. In her scientific quest to discover more about this fascinating natural phenomenon, she is preceded by some of the giants of natural science including Charles Darwin - and even Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle.
The verdant rainforest. Green and pristine from above. Leaf-filtered light. Exotic animals. Colorful birds. Rainforest baths and soul therapy. It's fair to say that these make up the romantic image most people have about tropical rainforest. But ecological researchers David Tng, Deborah Apgaua and Susan Laurance explain that a foreboding scenario brews for Australia's precious pockets of green.
Within 50 years of Captain James Cook's landing at Botany Bay, in the land then declared to be New South Wales, wildlife species nurtured through more than 60,000 years of Indigenous stewardship began to disappear. First, wildlife such as birds and marsupials, unique to this island continent, moved from their regional habitats under pressure from introduced grazing animals - and then far too many moved through to extinction. It is a sad irony that many of these lost species would not be known at all today, were it not for the concurrent efforts of European collectors, natural historians, artists and taxidermists who sought out these rare species, documented them, often preserved their bodies and then sent them off to wealthy collectors and museums both in Europe and Australia. It is a tragic irony that while the most successful collectors were those who employed the help of skilled local Indigenous men, women and children, the short term benefits of sugar, tobacco, 'white man tools' and clothing would also mark the dire disruption, for evermore, of an orderly and balanced life for Indigenous Australians. It was a slow-moving disaster for many keystone Australian wildlife species and for Indigenous communities alike. In Australia's First Naturalists, authors Penny Olsen and Lynette Russell re-set the record on what is known about early Australian zoology, wildlife collection and research. In this richly illustrated book the authors shed light on the crucial contributions of Aboriginal individuals - both named an unnamed - even though very few were properly acknowledged in colonial natural history texts. Mike Sullivan presents the second of a three-part series.
Public understanding about the complexity, threats and environmental importance of flying foxes has taken on an entirely new perspective thanks to the work of people like conservation and wildlife photographer Doug Gimesy.
Like so much else that is being rediscovered about First Australians' culture, storylines and knowledge of the seasons - and behaviours of wildlife across the continent - the night sky is rich with vital information. As part of his remarkable research with the Australian Indigenous Astronomy Research Group, cultural astronomer Trevor Leaman has mapped out a treasure trove of celestial clusters and legends that describe land and sea creatures, and their seasonal behaviours, which have helped Indigenous people sustain effective hunting and gathering practices for millennia.
To Western Australian horticulturist Mark Tucek, bush tucker knowledge is a millennia-old gift from First Australians that modern Australians have ignored for far too long. That's why his nursery is working with Indigenous people to not only grow natural food species but also to help educate school children through the Tucker Bush program.
Even for those professional researchers who study behavioral ecology, few species can match the fascination of Australia's tiny peacock spiders of Queensland, NSW and WA. Dr Damian Elias, the principal investigator at the University of California Berkeley's Elias Lab, explains the science behind the colours - and colourful behaviours - of these enormously fascinating creatures.
It is no secret that Australia has one of the worst records in the world for preserving biodiversity, having lost more mammal and plant species in the past 200 years than any other country. It's not over yet - a comparison of trends in recent extinctions, with current levels of threat, suggests that the rate of extinction is likely to increase. Researcher Hayley Geyle and a team at Charles Darwin University are identifying which species are at highest risk so that appropriate management actions can be implemented in an attempt to secure their future.
Welcome to the Anthropocene - a time of unprecedented global change. Recent research by Will Steffen and colleagues shows that the Earth's climate has been changing 170 times faster since the 1970s than in the whole of the previous 7000 years, and we know why. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, the release of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels - coal, oil and gas - has wrought extraordinary changes on our atmosphere and altered the very nature of the Earth's climate system, explains Lesley Hughes from the Climate Council. Such rapid change will test many species' ability to adapt and survive. But what, if anything, are we doing about it?
Gliders, especially the greater glider (Petauroides volans), have been on Wildlife Queensland's radar for more than a decade. Their dedicated Queensland Glider Network (QGN) has been monitoring glider populations in tree hollows and nest boxes across South East Queensland since 2006, most recently in the Redland City Council and Moreton Bay Regional Council local government areas. The greater glider is a highly specialised arboreal marsupial that feeds primarily on eucalyptus leaves and flowers and is sensitive to environmental change and predation. Sadly, we may be the greatest threat posed to its existence, explains Penelope Webster, as we're responsible for the widespread habitat destruction that threatens its long-term viability.
It is no secret that Australia has one of the worst records in the world for preserving biodiversity, having lost more mammal and plant species in the past 200 years than any other country. It's not over yet - a comparison of trends in recent extinctions, with current levels of threat, suggests that the rate of extinction is likely to increase. Researcher Hayley Geyle and a team at Charles Darwin University are identifying which species are at highest risk so that appropriate management actions can be implemented in an attempt to secure their future.
The platypus has intrigued and baffled scientists for centuries. In 1799, when the first pelt was examined by zoologist George Shaw in London, its bizarre appearance led to it being thought a hoax – a paradoxical mash-up of a duck’s bill and feet, a beaver’s tail, and an otter’s body. When no stitching was found, the specimen was accepted, ushering in an overhaul of mammalian classification. More than 200 years later, this elusive monotreme still confounds. Researchers such as Tamielle Brunt from Wildlife Queensland, Josh Griffiths from EnivroDNA, and Gilad Bino from the Platypus Conservation Initiative are tasked with understanding how this species survives, the threats it faces, and how many individuals remain in the wild. They’re aided in their mission by a new technology: eDNA.
Sale of coffee beans provides the only regular income for villages in the 187,000 ha YUS Landscape of Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea, enabling previously low-income families to afford health and education services and increasing food security. Addressing these needs alleviates pressure on the region's biodiversity and strengthens the community's commitment to conservation, thus directly improving outcomes for wildlife, writes Chris Banks from Zoos Victoria.
The notion of rarity connotes a precious delicacy, and a need for tender, gentle care. This is certainly the case in conservation biology. When populations of rare plants are found, they are protected: fenced off, signed to stop careless or ignorant disturbance, their location kept top-secret, tiptoed around by reverent botanists, and generally protected from the world outside, which, admittedly, often made them rare in the first place. But what of the rare species that require a bit of 'tough love' to germinate and complete their life cycles? Lack of regular disturbance may be detrimental to their persistence, writes Jen Silcock.
