266 Monitoring Threatened Species and Ecological Communities
● (^) The geographical isolation of the reserves, and the associated ecological and
climatic differences. Staff become experts in their particular park and species,
but maintaining a central support base that spans all reserves is difficult.
● (^) The cost associated with natural resource management activities in remote
locations such as Christmas Island and Pulu-Keeling Island is daunting,
requiring innovative and modified solutions compared with the mainland.
● (^) The lack of internal capacity in complex data analysis techniques has led to a
reliance on the goodwill of external research and academic partners.
● (^) Management and monitoring focus has favoured fauna, with threatened f lora
action mostly confined to seed banking and invasive weed control.
● (^) The need to balance resources between threat mitigation and monitoring.
Lesson learned
Parks Australia is instituting programs and policy aimed at increasing capability
and capacity to adequately tackle many of these challenges. This includes:
● (^) developing a consistent approach to prioritising which species to monitor using
a logical and appropriate method for grouping threatened taxa
● (^) increasing coverage of monitoring programs by focusing on species groupings
rather than individual species
● (^) promoting staff mobility through transfers or short placements to broaden
their experience and create internal support networks
● (^) fostering innovative approaches while ensuring adequate support in survey
methods, data management, analysis and reporting for park-based science staff
● (^) developing and/or enhancing partnerships with research institutions to address
knowledge and capability gaps.
References
Dennison S, McAlpin S, Chapple DG, Stow A (2015) Genetic divergence among
regions containing the vulnerable Great Desert Skink (Liopholis kintorei) in the
Australian arid zone. PLoS One 10 (6), e0128874. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0128874
Woinarski JCZ, Armstrong M, Brennan KEC, Fisher A, Griffiths AD, Hill B, et al.
(2010) Monitoring indicates rapid and severe decline of native small mammals in
Kakadu National Park, northern Australia. Wildlife Research 37 , 116 –126.
doi:10.1071/WR09125