Researcher Bio

Chris is a Landscape and Biodiversity Conservation Ecologist with Biolinks Alliance, where he plays a key role in establishing and delivering ecological monitoring programs to measure the impact of projects across Central Victoria.

He has significant conservation ecology experience across various ecosystems and ecological communities, completing a PhD (University of Queensland), an MSc (University of Melbourne), and an internship with the Australian Wildlife Conservancy.

Project Overview

Chris and the team at Biolinks Alliance, an organisation that restores and reconnects large landscapes across Central Victoria, are repairing a 138 hectare watershed in the Springs Plains Nature Conservation Reserve (NCR) to demonstrate how Box-Ironbark Forests like these can withstand a hotter and more extreme climate.

Degradation from gold mining and timber harvesting has resulted in a loss of topsoil, Large Old Trees (LOTs), and species diversity in Box-Ironbark Forest systems in the state, leading to impacts such as gully erosion and flash flooding in nearby areas.

At Spring Plains NCR, Chris and the Biolinks Alliance team are attempting to restore missing ecological processes, and aiming to increase productivity and biodiversity at the site. On-ground interventions were completed in Spring 2023, and Biolinks Alliance is committed to monitoring the response of ecological indicators at the site for 10 years.

Using a combination of survey methods including bioacoustics, camera trapping, and nest boxes, among other methods and with a strong citizen science focus, the project aims to restore an initial pilot site so others can learn from and adopt this approach at scale.

Objectives

The Spring Plains Watershed Repair Pilot Project aims to demonstrate:

• the great potential of landscape–scale restoration to quickly and significantly reverse trends of decline (locally) using science-backed approaches; and
• that the approach can be cost–effectively adapted and scaled–up across the region to restore ecological resilience, soil health and productivity, and help this landscape withstand the impacts of climate change.

Methodology

The project centres around the implementation of three key interventions that have each been used individually with success, but have not previously been brought together:

• Ecological thinning of dense, immature eucalypt regrowth to accelerate forest maturation

• Ripping along contours to slow water down and allow it to infiltrate into the soil

• Chain of ponds through the gully to slow water flow and minimise gully erosion

Using the 138 hectare watershed as the experimental site, compared with a similarly sized untouched control watershed, Chris and the Biolinks Alliance team are using a number of methods to measure key indicators including, but not limited to:

• Camera trapping (small and medium mammals)

• Spotlighting (nocturnal mammals and birds)

• Bird assemblage plot counts

• Tile plot surveys (reptiles)

• Lightsheets and pollinator trapping (invertebrates)

• Bioacoustics (birds, bats and frogs)

• Vegetation structure and diversity transects

• Nestboxes (arboreal mammals)

Role of Bioacoustics

The Biolinks Alliance team will use bioacoustics to measure the presence of birds, bats and frogs at the treatment and control sites.

In particular, they identified bats as a group of species well suited to bioacoustic monitoring given their nocturnal and elusive nature.

After a test deployment in early spring to monitor nocturnal birds, Chris has now completed two of three deployments targeting bats for the 2024-25 season across the treatment and control sites using four Mini Bat 2 devices (two placed at each site).

With a highway on one side of the site and farm land on parts of the other three sides, it was important to pick monitoring spots that were independent of those potentially influencing aspects. The monitoring devices were placed in locations that gave them approximately a 200m buffer from these features.

Chris used a ladder to strap the devices to a tree at 3-4m above ground level in clutter free areas and potential flyways.

Matching roughly equivalent sites within the two zones, each deployment lasted two weeks, with the aim of completing three deployments per season.

Having pulled data from the first deployment, Chris has identified at least six species of bats through clustering on Kaleidoscope Pro, with further analysis required to explore potential species grouping.

Over time it is expected the structure of the treatment site will change as the understory and midstory rebound, and the canopy matures faster, offering opportunities for long-term comparisons.

Measuring Success

Community engagement and uptake of similar methodology in other ecological repair projects are a big part of this project, with some stakeholder groups and local landholders already using the initiative to inform how they will manage land moving forward.

Early positive signs at the treatment site include water moving more slowly through the area when compared with the control site, though this is admittedly difficult to quantify.

In the longer term, a variety of indicators will be used to measure the success of the project, including baseline soil composition and soil health, water infiltration analysis, understory diversity and abundance, and biodiversity indicators.

Moving Forward

Working with key partners including Parks Victoria and City of Greater Bendigo’s biodiversity team, Biolinks Alliance is committed to monitoring the outcomes of the project for 10 years, while also working closely with communities and other stakeholders to foster broader uptake of these approaches across Central Victoria.