Northern Bettong Project Update #8: Jan

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JESSICA KOLECK

BETTONG

OORT NORTHERN FROM A NORTHERN BETTONG PROJECT UPDATE #8: JAN – MAR 2017

A breakthrough with oorts

I must admit, I had never heard of an oort until I started working on this project. But these bettong spit balls have captivated me, and I’m excited by what information they contain! Don’t know what I’m talking about? Check out this previous Community Update to learn all about oorts! We’re learning more and more about oorts and the interesting behaviour that produces them. For instance, not all northern bettong populations AUS - make oorts in the same abundance. At one site, you may not be able to avoid / WWF stepping on them because there are so many on the ground, while at another site only a few kilometres away you can walk 500 metres and not find a single oort. Why is this? One theory is that different sites have slightly different soils, with the amounts of nutrients and minerals varying between areas. This in turn may influence the composition of the grass, perhaps STEPHANIE TODD / JCU making the grass that grows in some areas tough and fibrous (and more © likely to be turned into an oort), while at other sites its more tender and easily digestible. Another idea is that there are other more preferred food resources available at some locations, and the northern bettongs only turn to grass tubers when they absolutely need to. Or perhaps oorts still are

NORTHERN BETTONG produced in these areas but at different times of the year, maybe because of subtle climatic variation. We’ll need more research into the northern bettong’s diet and behaviours to fully understand this difference.

It also seems that the size of the oort doesn’t necessarily link to the species that produced it, but rather reflects the species of grass it came from. For example, all cockatoo grass (an important food source for northern bettongs) oorts that we’ve collected look the same, even if they were

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produced by rufous rat kangaroos instead of northern bettongs. This means we can’t use dimensional analysis to determine which species produced the oorts, but a newly developed technique can.

Researchers have been successful at extracting DNA out of oorts and using We now have a genetic that genetic material to determine which species produced it. This is a bit tricky for a number of reasons. Firstly, DNA naturally degrades once it’s outside the body, so oorts need to be fresh for this technique to work (i.e. non-invasive survey collected and frozen before all the DNA disappears). This is especially the case in moist, warm environments where northern bettongs are found. method to gauge northern bettong There are also enzymes in saliva that could further break down DNA over time. Secondly, while there may be DNA from the animal’s mouth on the presence oort, there is also lots of DNA coming from the grass, bacteria and other contaminants on the forest floor. More importantly, plants contain compounds that are known to interfere with the chemical reactions in the lab during the analysis. While this complicates the results, incredibly, researchers are still able to overcome these obstacles and produce reliable results. Looking forward

This exciting step forward means that we have an extra survey tool in our belt. For years, park rangers and scientists have seen oorts on the ground well outside the Lamb Range in Queensland, and wondered if northern

bettongs could be hiding away in patches of habitat yet to be detected. Now AUS

- we can collect those oorts, and confidently tell if they are from northern bettongs or from other species like the common rufous rat kangaroo.

Trials with DNA extracted from oort samples have indicated that it might be / JCU ./ WWF / JCU

possible to take this analysis to the next level and identify individual animals. Researchers are working on this, and field collections of fresh oorts are planned to explore and trial this novel technique. A new, non-invasive TEPHANIE TODD

S approach to genetics can have big impacts on the way we determine the

Signing off until the next break from the field - Jess Koleck

OORT IN THE LAB Special thanks

A huge thank you to our volunteers from the first quarter of 2017: Sophie Holt, Rhys Sharry, Wise Hok Wai Lum and WWF-Australia interns Naomi Bowie and Penny King. We couldn’t do it without you!

If you would like to volunteer with us, please send me an email at [email protected].

The Northern Bettong Project is a collaboration between WWF-Australia, James Cook University and the Queensland Government. Funding provided by the Australian Government’s Caring for Our Country grant.

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