A South Australian wildlife reserve in the state’s arid north has counted its second highest number of native animals in 25 years.
Key points:
- The team at Arid Recovery has collected a record number of reptiles in its annual count
- Heavy rain earlier this year increased breeding among a range of different species
- Of the 1,045 animals caught during the survey, 800 were different species of reptiles
Each year, the team at Arid Recovery near Roxby Downs conduct a week-long pitfall trapping survey to collect data about how different mammals and reptiles are faring before returning them to the wild.
General manager Katherine Tuft said heavy rain across the state’s outback in January contributed to this year’s success, and set a new record for the highest number of reptiles caught in one year.
Dr Tuft said 1,045 animals were caught during the survey, 800 of which were different species of reptiles.
“It seems that the rainfall when it’s like that is just so pervasive in increasing the productivity of the desert ecosystems out here.
“They’re just really good at taking advantage of good conditions so they can breed up very quickly, and in fact a lot of the animals we were catching were young ones that had recently hatched or recently born.”
What is pitfall trapping?
Pitfall trapping is the method used to capture the animals.
“Essentially, you dig buckets into the ground so that the top is flush with the ground surface and then you run a little fence using fly mesh between the rows of buckets,” Dr Tuft said.
“As animals are moving around doing their business they bump into the fence and wander along and then fall into the bucket.
“Then we come along at dawn and at dusk to check the pits and look for what we’ve caught and work out what species they are and take some measurements and let them go again.”
The method has given researches an insight into the abundance and diversity of small mammals and reptiles living within the reserve.
Dr Tuft said the process also provided information about about how major weather events effect the ecosystem.
“This year was the 25th year of running the survey, so it’s a really long-term data set now and we’ve been able to see how things change over the cycles of drought and wetter years out here and that can be really dramatic in the desert,” she said.
She said one of the most important aspects of the survey was the understanding it provided researchers on the effect of the predator-proof fence and the reintroduction of animals that were locally extinct.
“We can see how that changes the game for some of these smaller creatures that were in the landscape. So, there’s some winners and losers.”