South Australia’s National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) is calling for volunteers to help identify endangered animals that were captured in images in bushland using motion sensing cameras.
Manager of Threatened Species at NPWS, Jason Higham said 70 detection cameras were installed to monitor threatened species following the January Cherry Gardens bushfire.
“This survey is our first detailed, evidence-based look at how the landscape is recovering,” Mr Higham said.
“Images captured have been uploaded to the DigiVol website, and we’re hoping community members will log-in and help with the important task of identifying local threatened species,” he said.
“This is the first phase of a multi-year project which will see NPWS collect data through annual surveys to help gain information about the survival and recolonisation of priority threatened animals associated with these habitats.
Mr Higham said species of interest included the endangered Southern Brown Bandicoot and the endangered Mt Lofty Ranges subspecies of the Chestnut-rumped Heathwren.
“The results will help us understand how these threatened species are using unburnt areas and how they are responding as the vegetation regrows,” he said.
“Information gathered will provide our ecologists with vital information about habitat recovery and inform the planning of future management in the area including fire management and prescribed burning.
“Some habitats in this area haven’t been burnt for a long time and are getting to the point that they no longer provide suitable habitat for these species, so a balanced approach is needed when planning future fire management activities in the landscape.”
Mr Higham said volunteers could join the endangered animal expedition at the crowdsourced digitisation platform DigiVol, developed by the Australian Museum in collaboration with the Atlas of Living Australia.
DigiVol can be accessed at this PS News link.
