Assoc. Professor Peter Banks, Conservation Biologist at the School of Biological Sciences, the University of Sydney gave a special presentation on Monday 23rd April.

The talk focused on Assoc. Professor Banks research on alien rodents and how he is using manipulative experiments to reveal the nature of rodent impacts on native species, and the functional role of rodents in ecosystem processes. Assoc. Professor Banks also discussed how he is developing a new understanding about the exploitation of social signals by both predator and prey and aiming to generate a new theory on the reactive foraging behaviour of predators and use this theory to solve conservation problems.

Find out more and download the podcast.

Corey Bradshaw, one of the authors involved in the paper

The paper titled, ‘Accuracy of species identification by fisheries observers in a north Australian shark fishery’ provides the first estimates of the ability of scientific observers to identify five species of morphologically-similar carcharhinid sharks in a fishery in northern Australia.  Results provide the first benchmark of identification accuracy of observers for carcharhinid sharks in northern Australia and show that estimates of error in species identifications need to be incorporated into management strategies to ensure successful recovery of the many recently over-fished shark populations.

Read the paper online to find out more about this research.

Phil Cassey, one of the authors on this paper

The paper titled, ‘Why are birds’ eggs colourful? Eggshell pigments co-vary with life-history and nesting ecology among British breeding non-passerine birds’  investigates how the concentrations of avian eggshell pigments vary among related species, and whether this variability is associated with either eggshell appearance and/or species life-history traits. Suprisingly, this element remains poorly understood as biologists have tended to focus on the structure and biochemistry of the avian eggshell instead.

Download the paper to find out more about this research.

The Awards were first introduced in 2005, and since then the State Government has recognised the effort and achievement of more than 40 scientists, many of whom are world leaders in their respective fields. Five categories are included in the 2012 Awards, with a total of nine awards.

The State’s leading scientists, researchers, PhD students and science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM) professionals and educators are encouraged to nominate for one of the following categories:

• South Australian Scientist of the Year
•  PhD Research Excellence awards:
•  Early Career STEM Professional awards:
•  Early Career STEM Educator of the Year awards:
•  SA Early Career Researcher – SA Tall Poppy of the Year

More information about each category, and details on how to nominate for an award can be found on the Science Excellence Awards SA website.

Nominations close 5 pm Friday 8 June 2012.

Winners will be announced at a gala dinner on Friday 17 August 2012 at the Intercontinental Adelaide.

REDD (Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) is a UN-promoted scheme that allows countries to trade in carbon credits to keep forests intact. It is mainly targeted at developing nations where deforestation and exploitation are a major threat.

Professor Corey Bradshaw

In a paper published online in the journal Conservation Letters, ecology researchers from Australia and South Africa argue that REDD projects can suffer from three major problems. They have proposed strengthening the scheme by using insurance policies and premiums, creating a new scheme known as iREDD.

“The idea of paying a nation to protect its forests in exchange for carbon pollution offsets can potentially reduce overall emissions by keeping the trees alive, and ensure a lot of associated biodiversity gets caught up in the conservation process,” says Professor Corey Bradshaw, Director of Ecological Modelling at the University of Adelaide’s Environment Institute and a senior author of the paper.

Professor Bradshaw and colleagues from James Cook University and the University of Pretoria have suggested using a form of REDD ‘insurance policy’ (iREDD) to avoid these problems.

iREDD involves the buyer and seller together assessing the risk in a forest conservation project, agreeing on that risk and then purchasing an insurance policy scaled to that risk.

Read the full Media Release to find out more

NCCARF seeks to fund a set of projects to integrate research outputs and generate an information portfolio on climate change impacts and adaptation responses, one for each State and Territory. There is $600,000 available for the project(s), which need to be completed in six to nine months.

The projects will be awarded under a competitive research call.

Applications close 27th April and should be made using the form included in the information pack available via the NCCARF website.

A detailed description and more information about the research call is available here.

TREND is a component of the Long Term Ecological Research Network, a long-term environmental monitoring program dedicated to recording information on Australian ecosystems and key species.

TREND will be using the launch to intoduce the brand, project and Smart Phone app to its stakeholders and government associates. Environment Institute members Professor Andrew Lowe, head of Terrestrial Ecosystems and Professor Corey Bradshaw, head of Marine Ecosystems, as well as Dr Peter Hayman, head of Primary Production will be attending the event and showcasing some of their latest research along with Susan Sweeney, presenting policy and collaboration with the Government of South Australia.

This event is invitation only, however key presentations will be made available on the TREND website shortly after the event.

The paper titled, ‘Genetic structure of introduced swamp buffalo subpopulations in tropical Australia’ describes the genetic population structure of one of Australia’s more destructive introduced mammals – the Asian swamp buffalo (Bubalus bubalis).

Download the paper to discover the findings of this research.

Hosted by the South Australian Research and Development Institute and The University of Adelaide, this conference will address the challenges of understanding the movement patterns of aquatic animals and their significance, featuring – Dr Steven Campana as international keynote speaker and numerous national keynote presenters.

The Australian Society for Fish Biology (ASFB) and the Oceania Chondrichthyan Society (OCS) are two independent organisations that aim to promote research, education and management for different groups of aquatic animals throughout the Oceania regions.

Abstract submission and registration for the meeting are now open with details, including registration fees, provided in the registration brochure available on the conference website.
The registration form must be completed and either faxed or emailed to the conference organiser.

There are numerous travel grants and conference prizes for student members of either the ASFB or OCS. For details about eligibility and how to apply refer to the websites of both organisations.

Important key dates:

Closing date for abstracts: 1st May 2012

Notification of abstract acceptance: late May 2012

Early bird registration deadline: 31st May 2012

For more information visit the conference website.

Big leaf mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla) is the most prized mahogany timber around the world. It is at risk of extinction in its native habitats because of the timber trade, particularly in Central and South America.

Martin Breed, one of the key researchers involved in this paper

The important role played by the trees’ pollen in the health and re-growth of mahogany forests has been studied in order to better understand how such a threatened species can be brought back from the brink of extinction.

The researchers found that the extensive exploitation of mahogany forests has had a major impact on the diversity and availability of the trees’ pollen. This in turn limits the ability of individual trees to grow and provide cross-fertilization for other mahogany trees.

According to Professor Andy Lowe, this discovery has the potential to impact the way we think about restoring forests and shows us why it is vital to protect areas of high conservation value

The project was largely funded from the European Union through the project SEEDSOURCE, with a portion of the funding coming from a grant awarded by the Australian Research Council. Dr Carlos Navarro, who was employed by CATIE (the Tropical Agricultural Research and Higher Education Center) in Costa Rica at the time, was primarily responsible for directing the fieldwork and the collection of leaf and seed material used in the analysis and was the researcher who did the growth assessments.

Read the full media release to find out more about the results of this research and what Martin and Andy have to say about their findings.

The paper is titled ‘Shifts in reproductive assurance strategies and inbreeding costs associated with habitat fragmentation in Central American mahogany’ and  involves Environment Institute members Martin Breed, Michael Gardner (also from Flinders University), Kym Ottewell (also from Tutane University, New Orleans), Andrew Lowe (also from DENR) and Carlos Navarro from Universidad Nacional, Costa Rica.

Read the full paper published in Ecology Letters