While conducting post-bushfire wildlife monitoring near Maclean, NSW our team captured a squirrel glider using an Elliot trap. Once it was safe to do so, the squirrel glider was released early in the morning by Ecosure’s ecologist Jennifer Young. The fire started in the first week of September 2019 and lasted two weeks due to treacherous and dry conditions. Named the Shark Creek fire it started 1km from the squirrel glider release site and went on to consume tens of thousands of hectares, eventually burning all the way to Yamba, NSW.
Click here to watch the video https://youtu.be/d4PRQ-s6uF4
This beautiful glider was just one of many species targeted as part of post-fire monitoring in an Ecosure Stewardship Agreement site. Ecosure uses a range of wildlife survey methods including camera traps, harp traps for microbats, cage and Elliot traps, song meters and pitfall traps.
Post-fire monitoring is extremely important to establish baseline information on what has survived, which is particularly crucial for threatened and range restricted species. These unprecedented fires have burnt through 10 million hectares to date, with the end of the fire season still some way off.
Other monitoring is also occurring in a proposed Conservation Area near Tullymorgan which was consumed as part of the massive Myall Creek Bora Creek blaze. Ecosure’s fauna monitoring cameras captured eastern yellow robins having a bath after the bushfires went through at Tullymorgan.
Click here to watch the video https://youtu.be/–_UxlK9s4o
For more information contact Nigel Cotsell, Manager, Coffs Harbour and Senior Ecologist, on email: ncotsell@ecosure.com.au