Report Was Prepared by Colleen Sims, Saul Cowen and Tony Friend
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Monitoring Source Populations of Fauna for the Dirk Hartog Island National Park Ecological Restoration Project – 2018 Colleen Sims, Saul Cowen and Tony Friend Biodiversity and Conservation Science June 2019 Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Locked Bag 104 Bentley Delivery Centre WA 6983 Phone: (08) 9219 9000 Fax: (08) 9334 0498 www.dbca.wa.gov.au © Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions on behalf of the State of Western Australia 2019, June 2019 This work is copyright. You may download, display, print and reproduce this material in unaltered form (retaining this notice) for your personal, non-commercial use or use within your organisation. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, all other rights are reserved. Requests and enquiries concerning reproduction and rights should be addressed to the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions. This report was prepared by Colleen Sims, Saul Cowen and Tony Friend. Questions regarding the use of this material should be directed to: Senior Project Officer – Dirk Hartog island National Park Ecological Restoration Project Animal Science Program, Biodiversity and Conservation Science Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Locked Bag 104 Bentley Delivery Centre WA 6983 Phone:08 – 9405 5103 Email:[email protected] The recommended reference for this publication is: Sims C, Cowen S and Friend J.A (2019) Monitoring Fauna Source Populations for the Dirk Hartog Island National Park Ecological Restoration Project - 2018, Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, Perth. This document is available in alternative formats on request. Please note: urls in this document which conclude a sentence are followed by a full point. If copying the url please do not include the full point. Contents Acknowledgments ........................................................................................................... ix Summary ......................................................................................................................... x 1 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 1 2 Methods ...................................................................................................................... 2 2.1 Logistics and transport ....................................................................................... 2 2.2 Trapping ............................................................................................................. 2 2.3 Spotlighting ........................................................................................................ 3 2.4 Capture and transport of dibblers for Perth Zoo breeding program. ................... 4 2.5 Capture, handling and transport of hare wallabies for translocations to DHI ...... 4 2.6 Sampling for bandicoot papillomatosis carcinomatosis virus type 1 (BPCV1). ... 4 2.7 Analysis .............................................................................................................. 4 3 Results ........................................................................................................................ 6 3.1 Dorre Island, Shark Bay ..................................................................................... 6 3.1.1 Trapping ...................................................................................................... 6 3.1.2 Spotlighting .................................................................................................. 7 3.2 Bernier Island, Shark Bay .................................................................................. 8 3.2.1 Trapping ...................................................................................................... 8 3.2.2 Spotlighting ................................................................................................ 10 3.3 Bernier and Dorre Island population estimates ................................................ 10 3.3.1 Abundance estimates of spotlight data using Distance analysis ................ 11 3.3.2 Abundance estimates based on trapping data using SECR ...................... 19 3.4 BPCV1 Disease screening ............................................................................... 22 3.5 Translocations from Bernier and Dorre Islands ................................................ 22 3.6 Boullanger, Escape and Whitlock Islands, Jurien Bay. .................................... 24 4 Rainfall and environmental conditions....................................................................... 26 4.1 Shark Bay......................................................................................................... 26 4.2 Jurien Bay ........................................................................................................ 27 5 Discussion ................................................................................................................. 28 5.1 Bernier and Dorre Islands ................................................................................ 28 5.1.1 Logistical considerations............................................................................ 28 5.1.2 Methodological considerations .................................................................. 28 5.1.3 Estimates of abundance and translocation ................................................ 30 Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions ` v Series name 5.1.4 Disease ...................................................................................................... 30 5.2 Jurien Bay Islands ............................................................................................ 31 5.3 Rainfall, vegetation condition and climate trends on Bernier and Dorre Islands. ...................................................................................................................... 31 References. ................................................................................................................... 33 Appendices ................................................................................................................... 35 Appendices Appendix 1 Field schedules for monitoring trips ........................................................ 35 1.1 Dorre Island monitoring. ...................................................................................... 35 1.2 Bernier Island monitoring program ....................................................................... 36 1.3 Translocation ....................................................................................................... 36 Figures Figure 1a.Abundance estimates of banded hare-wallabies on Bernier and Dorre Islands ....................................................................................................................... 16 Figure 1b.Abundance estimates of rufous hare-wallabies on Bernier and Dorre Islands ....................................................................................................................... 16 Figure 1c.Abundance estimates for boodies on Bernier and Dorre Islands ................... 17 Figure 1d.Abundance estimates for Shark Bay bandicoots on Bernier and Dorre Islands ....................................................................................................................... 17 Figure 1e.Abundance estimates for banded hare-wallabies (BHW), rufous hare- wallabies (RHW), boodies and Shark Bay bandicoots (SBB) on Bernier and Dorre Islands in 2018 .......................................................................................................... 18 Figure 2a.Relative abundance on Dorre Island (2016-18) ............................................. 21 Figure 2b.Relative abundance on Bernier Island (2016-18) .......................................... 21 Figure 3a.Numbers of dibblers captured on Boullanger Island since 2005 ................... 25 Figure 3b.Numbers of dibblers captured on Whitlock Island since 2005 ....................... 25 Figure 4. Annual rainfall at Carnarvon airport, Shark Bay airport, Denham and Dorre Island 1997-2018 ...................................................................................................... 27 Tables Table 1.Dorre Island trapping results. ............................................................................. 6 Table 2.Dorre Island 2016, 2017 and 2018 spotlighting results ...................................... 7 Table 3.Bernier Island trapping results ............................................................................ 9 Table 4.Bernier Island 2016,2017 and 2018 spotlighting results ................................... 10 Table 5.Abundance estimates for all species, Bernier and Dorre Island, 2011-2018 .... 12 vi Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Table 6.Density and abundance estimates from trapping data at Dorre and Bernier Island 2016-18 .......................................................................................................... 20 Table 7. Numbers of different species translocated off Bernier and Dorre Islands in spring 2018. .............................................................................................................. 23 Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions ` vii Series name viii Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions Project title Acknowledgments This Project is funded by the Gorgon Barrow Island Net Conservation