The Koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is an iconic species that attracts considerable public attention. Its appeal to international visitors contributes significantly to Australia's Tourism Industry.Conservation of the koala and its habitat is therefore a priority.
A growing additional threat is climate change. Under warming climates mortality rates will potentially increase, as a result of the koalas low tolerance of prolonged heat. Climate change will likely result in a decline of nutritional quality and moisture content of koala food trees. The Koala is a specialist in surviving in a poor energy diet and the koala is sensitive to changes in the food supply. An increase in energy spent finding food may result in less energy available for reproduction and rearing of young with subsequent impacts on the fitness of populations and persistence of the species in some areas. An understanding of how koala's respond to changes in their habitat is critical to the conservation of the species.
At Cape Otway, Koala's occur in high densities, particularly in Manna Gum habitats. Densities of up to 17 koala's per hectare or 23 koala's per hectare of tree cover have been reported for Manna Gum woodland in this area with over 50% Manna Gum either dead or in extremely in poor condition.
Cape Otway provides a unique opportunity to investigate the response of koalas to environmental change, the process involved in koala population regulation, and the over-browsing impacts of koalas on habitats and other fauna. This information is critical in development management strategies (e.g. revegetation, translocation programs) to conserve this species and its habitats. This research would also allow a further understanding of the ecology of koalas and their resilience to environmental change through comparing the ecology of this southern koala population with that of koalas in Queensland.
The goal of today was to determine tree selection and use by koalas, temporal variation associated with habitat change, describe the habitat that the koalas were using and structure of their habitat. This would provide the foundation of how the koala goes about using the forest and also allows to track the dynamics of the forest.
For the day we split into 2 teams with a sheet that had random numbers on it eg :
99 100 29 38
89 67 19 78
15 25 49 16
We used the numbers on the sheets to step out the the vegetation and then proceeded to measure out the vegetation (eg 99 that would mean taking 99 steps then stopping). From where we stood we needed to mark our a quadrant.
This meant that standing at the centre we needed to draw an imaginary square. This meant dividing the area into 4 so that we could measure all trees and shrubs in the quadrant closest to the centre point. The measurement consisted me standing in the centre of the square holding onto a measuring tape and my partner walking to the nearest tree or shrub and measuring the distance, the circumference of the tree or if there was a shrub closest then we needed to measure the shrub and all branches greater than 10 cms on the shrub. The data was collected and recorded on data sheets. The vegetation included mainly of the following trees and shrubs which were in the area, Manna Gums, Emu Bush, Casurina, Banksia and Bursaria.
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| Manna Gum |
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| Banksia |
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| Bursaria |
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| Casurina |
Today was a very laborious day as it involved lots of walking through bush where there was no tracks and hence we had to walk through bush and scrub. This was unavoidable as if we were towalk on the tracks this would not give us a true indication of what their environment would be like.
That night after dinner we all talked about what we would do the next day and decided that tomorrow we would head to a place to collect data not far from where we were staying. We were all very exhausted as this work was very repetitive with no variation.
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