Week 2 of Arid Recovery

This week started with a bang…a day off…only this time it was planned! (Bec, the Research Officer I'm working with, had a meeting in Adelaide). Working that day on my own would have meant walking around the reserve (which is a total of 123km², in addition to the 44km round trip to and back from the reserve), as I did not have access to a car and had not been signed off on the all-terrain vehicle (ATV)…However on Tuesday this changed and I am now deemed competent to drive the Polaris Razor ATV. (See the photo below for proof!) In fact, Tuesday turned out to be a very practical day indeed. Before sitting the Polaris test we embarked on the quest to find Beethoven (the cat we caught last week). A quest that Bec thought would take most of the morning, but actually only took an hour at the most! We had found him (woo), and unsurprisingly right at the opposite side of Red Lake to where he was hiding last week... but at least he was still in Red Lake and hadn’t hopped the fence...phew. 

Driving the Polaris ATV on the dunes!

 An important job Bec has to do on a weekly basis is to conduct radio transmitter checks to ensure all the collared stick-nest rats and burrowing bettongs (Bettongia lesueur) are alive and their location is known. On Tuesday afternoon it was the bettongs in Red Lake turn (Red Lake is the area with the feral cats). The bettongs collar is very nifty and the signal received from the collar can tell you whether the collar is in mortality mode (indicated by hearing rapid beeps), which is triggered when the collar has not moved for 12 hours. If this is heard it is possible the animal is dead. And low and behold this was the case for poor bettong channel 42 . Channel 42 was tracked to a cleared area under a tree...hmm…typical behaviour for a cat…its head intact but its insides clearly eaten and the bones broken…typical behaviour of a cat…and bite marks on its collar…you guessed it, typical behaviour for a cat! So it seems that there may be evidence of cat predation in the area with feral cats. Remembering the project aims to look at the prey naivety so evidence of predation pressure is just what we need. However, getting the results back from swabbing the collar for cat DNA will be the proof (which may take some time to get back)! (See the photo below if not eating your breakfast).

Bec swabbing the collar of the dead burrowing bettong (Bettongia lesueur) which was most likely killed by a feral cat.

On Tuesday afternoon we also managed to successfully track one, out of two, of the Western quolls (Dasyurus geoffroii) which were introduced into the Northern Expansion  in May (creating the quoll predator expansion). (If you are getting confused with the areas, don't worry I still am, there is a map below). Our purpose for tracking Sepia (the quoll)… to deposit some quoll poo outside her current home (poo that Bec had obtained from the Flinder’s ranges quoll reintroduction program). I can sense your disgust but hopefully you’ll understand the reason when I explain why…The faeces of an animal can tell you what they’re eating. We want to know what the quolls are eating. However despite four months of searching, Bec has only been able to find two quoll poos!  Quolls are known to use communal latrines in the wild so we have tried to simulate this by creating a fake latrine, by sticking quoll poo into the ground near Sepia using toothpicks – another delightful job! As this is a new approach who knows what Sepia’s response will be, maybe she’ll be scared away but hopefully she  next week we might find some of Sepia’s poo added to the pile.

Unfortunately the next day we could not find the second quoll, Koombana, so could not set up her latrine. Koombana is renowned for being an adventurer and has been located all over the Northern expansion (a 30km² area). Tracking Koombana would create a job position in itself!  
 

Map of the AR reserve. The main expansion, the first and the second have no predators, the Northern has 2 quolls and Red Lake has the cats. The dingo pen used to have dingo's however is not currently being used by the project.

During the week we also pulled in the SD cards for the camera traps in Red Lake and the photographs showed at least 3 feral cats.  When Bec added Beethoven in August she also added two other males and a female cat. All were desexed at the vet first (to control predator numbers) and not all were expected to stay like the last cat, Wolfgang, who got out after 10 days. But thankfully from the footage it looks like some of the cats have stayed and Beethoven may still have two friends. As additional evidence we also saw eye shine for cats ourselves when we were on the reserve at night catching Greater bilbies (Macrotis lagotis), probably one of the most fun ways to catch a mammal….

How to catch a bilby: one, get yourself vehicle; two, get yourself a team (comprising of a driver, a spotlighter and two fast runners); three, get some equipment (a couple of nets – however these are not essential, some bags to put the bilby in on capture). You can then set off driving around the reserve with the spotlighter scanning the surrounding area. On seeing a bilby the spotlighter shouts the direction (over there isn’t that helpful!). This is when the driver comes into action putting their foot on the accelerator to increase the speed of the vehicle to gain some distance on the bilby (believe me they are fast). The runners then leap out of the car after the bilby (after the driver has stopped) and catch the bilby by hand or using a net... It just shows you- traps are not always essential for catching mammals!

A greater bilby (Macrotis lagotis) just after it was caught. Two fingers around the neck and the other hand around its bum is the most secure and safe way to hold a bilby. 

Fitting a tail transmitter to a bilby 

1. Cutting a section of the bilby fur where the transmitter will be placed. Lisa's hairdressing skills are put into action!

2. Wrapping a layer of elastoplast first around the tail before glueing and taping the transmitter in place.

3. The final outcome: a bilby with tail transmittor attached. The piece dangling down is the aerial.

I’ve just realised I should now give you a background to why we needed to catch bilbies in the first place. I don’t want you to think that this is something that happens often on the Arid Recovery Reserve purely for fun! Lisa Steindler (PhD student from University of New South Wales) is doing her PhD specifically looking at Bilby’s and their predator awareness. To track the bilbies they are using tailtransmitters because bilbies have a habit of getting their feet caught in collars. To fit the tail transmitters they use Elastoplast tape, but sticking tape to fur is a recipe for disaster (sand gets into the tape and the transmitters don’t last long and fall off), so the fur must firstly be removed,this is when hairdresser Lisa comes into action, (see the photos below) before the tape is stuck.

 Unfortunately on both nights, we saw few bilbies and only managed to catch 1, so it seems like we’ll be bilby catching again soon, but only after we recover from the busy Sunday morning we had digging up an invasive plant called buffel grass which has taken over the local golf course!   

I’m really getting stuck into this internship which is providing me with a lot of experience both in and out of the reserve and I’ve even learned a practical life skill - how to tie a truckie knot. This week I also witnessed a wedge tailed eagle eating a bettong on the fence (photo below). However, despite many encounters with animals I am still yet to see a Mulga snake (Pseudechis australis)…Maybe next week!

The bettong we saw on the fence. Unfortunately the wedge tailed eagle (Aquila audax) flew away and we couldn't see whether the bettong had an ear tag as the head had been removed!

As we were driving out to the reserve one morning we were faced with a kangaroo on the road who continued to hop along the road for some distance.

One out of a total of fifteen bearded dragons we saw sitting on the fence one hot day this week!