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Wildlife Research Wildlife Research Society
Ecology, management and conservation in natural and modified habitats
Wildlife Research

Wildlife Research

Volume 45 Number 5 2018

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Wind farm development in otherwise natural landscapes may facilitate unintended (and undesirable) biodiversity consequences. Here, we quantify the effects of wind energy infrastructure on local biota, documenting a loss of diversity and altered community composition patterns. We caution that sustainable renewable energy development will require consideration of the potential negative effects of energy facilities on habitat quality and value.

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Large areas of river red gum (Eucalyptus camaldulensis) forests have declined in ecological condition and thinning has been promoted as a tool to reduce competition in dense, young stands of regrowth. This study reports initial responses of forest structure and fauna to large-scale thinning, which were mostly neutral or positive. Ongoing monitoring is required to detect long-term changes.

WR17092Effects of tourism disturbance on habitat quality and population size of the Chinese giant salamander (Andrias davidianus)

Qinghua Luo, Yingjie Song, Xiao Hu, Shenhai Zhu, Han Wang and Hongbing Ji
pp. 411-420
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Increasing tourism exerts serious impacts on the habitats of wildlife. To ascertain how tourism affects the habitat of the Chinese giant salamander (Andrias davidianus), an investigation was conducted in the Hunan Zhangjiajie Chinese Giant Salamander National Nature Reserve. The results showed that high levels of tourism disturbance had negative effects on habitat quality. The intensity of tourism disturbance needs be reduced to achieve the coordinated development of tourism and wild animal protection.

WR17102Success criteria not met, but valuable information gained: monitoring a reintroduction of the tammar wallaby

G. E. Watkins, N. Willers, H. Raudino, J. Kinloch and R. van Dongen
pp. 421-435
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Reviews of fauna translocations undertaken in Australia and globally reported that many fail because of predation by exotic predators, and the outcome of others were unknown because of inadequate post-release monitoring. We used GPS data-loggers and VHF radio-transmitters to evaluate the success of a tammar wallaby reintroduction. Although the reintroduction was not considered successful, valuable information was derived from the monitoring.


Underlying wildlife management are a set of generic principles describing prescriptive guidelines and empirical generalisations. We use the principles to evaluate three international wildlife management programs and show that the programs use most of the prescriptive principles but few of the empirical principles. We discuss the management implications and recommend programs should demonstrate the relationship between management efforts and the outcomes.

WR16175A novel approach for estimating densities of secretive species from road-survey and spatial-movement data

John D. Willson, Shannon E. Pittman, Jeffrey C. Beane and Tracey D. Tuberville
pp. 446-456
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Accurate estimates of abundance are critical for effective wildlife conservation and management, but the low detectability of many snakes defies traditional method for abundance estimation. We developed a novel technique that uses movement simulations to estimate density from road survey data and demonstrated our approach to generate the first density estimates for the imperiled Southern Hognose Snake (Heterodon simus). This method will enhance our ability to study snakes and other secretive wildlife species.

WR17125Dietary resource use and competition between white-tailed deer and introduced sika deer

David M. Kalb, Jacob L. Bowman and Randy W. DeYoung
pp. 457-472
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White-tailed deer have been displaced by sika deer in a growing portion of Maryland. The present paper reports dietary competition between white-tailed deer and sika deer through changes in niche breadth, resource overlap, and changes in resource quality in areas where both species are allopatric, and where they are sympatric. These results provide a novel way to investigate resource competition.

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