It’s 2019 and our planet is facing big and complex threats to biodiversity. There has never been a more pressing time to explore ways to improve how we address these threats and achieve real conservation impact - where people and nature thrive.

At Bush Heritage Australia, we have adopted an adaptive management framework based on the Open Standards for the Practice of Conservation (OS) to support our teams and our partners to plan, implement and monitor conservation projects. To this end we are better placed to learn what works, what doesn’t, and why — and ultimately adapt and improve on our work.

In this presentation we will demonstrate how the core elements of the OS, including the supporting tools Miradi and Miradi Share, can facilitate real adaptive management using examples from our conservation projects, including managing feral predators to protect key species.
Some of the core elements of the OS we will address will include:
• Defining what you care about and how you will measure current health and success
• Ranking and prioritising threats
• Ways of exploring project context, key threats, their drivers, and key stakeholders
• Developing SMART goals and objectives to guide your work
• Selecting the right strategies and testing the logic using a theory of change
• Defining a monitoring program and identifying knowledge gaps and research opportunities
• Developing a workplan and prioritising ‘what you need to do on Monday’.
• Reviewing and adapting the project based on your monitoring results.

In recent years the Monitoring and Evaluation of Indigenous Ranger Programs has been more focussed on inputs and outputs than outcomes and impacts, making it difficult for groups to assess the effectiveness of their land management activities on improving the health of key Targets. The Healthy Country Planning framework emphasises the importance of regularly reviewing outcomes and impacts to assess whether management activities need altering. In this presentation we discuss how we are using Two-Way science on the Kiwirrkurra Indigenous Protected Area to monitor the success of our fire management and cat control programs in improving our two threatened species targets – the bilby and great desert skink. For the bilby we monitor the response of food plants to burns conducted in cool and hot conditions, and use cameras to record predation pressure at burrows in managed and unmanaged areas. But our ultimate measure of success is the number of bilbies at sites which is determined through both interpretation of tracks by Expert Trackers and genetic analysis of faecal pellets. Similarly, for the great desert skink, we monitor predation pressure at a subset of burrows with remote cameras, and extent of habitat affected by fire through remote sensing but rely on tracking surveys to map and measure population extent and abundance. Skink burrows are detected and inspected by Expert Trackers who provide data on whether burrows are inhabited by great desert skinks, how many age-classes are present in each burrow and evidence of any disturbance from predators, hunters or fire.

Adaptive management (AM) is advocated in the natural resource management literature as a framework for managing ecological systems under uncertainty, yet it is rarely put into practice. Here, we combined a 28-year, 144-site, monitoring dataset for an iconic threatened Australian bird, the malleefowl (Leipoa ocellata), with mound activity and camera trap data from 10 AM experimental sites established to resolve uncertainty about the effectiveness of predator control as a conservation strategy for the species. We fitted a Poisson regression model within a Bayesian Hierarchical framework to all mound count data and found strong support for an effect of winter rainfall and time since fire on malleefowl breeding activity. We also found support for a positive effect of baiting density on mound activity, although we could not rule out a negative association. We fitted a zero-inflated Poisson regression model to 2 years of camera trap data from the 10 AM sites and found that the fox capture rate was significantly lower in Western Australia compared to South Australia, while cat capture rates were consistent across both states. The effect of predator baiting on fox and cat capture rates was uncertain, although we expect this uncertainty to be reduced with further camera trap monitoring. Continuation of the malleefowl AM experiment will help understand whether predator control is an effective conservation strategy for the species, and if management is adapted accordingly, will represent one of the largest AM experiments in the world.

Red-finned blue-eye (Scaturiginichthys vermeilipinnis) is one of Australia’s most rare and threatened freshwater fish, occurring in less than a dozen small artesian springs in arid western Queensland. Since the discovery of this species in 1990, population numbers have crashed due to the spread of the invasive mosquito-fish (Gambusia holbrooki) through their habitat during flooding events. The history of management of the endangered red-finned blue-eye has gone from reactive intervention in the early days of trying to prevent imminent extinction, to adaptive and data driven, where conservation actions are determined through question-based data analysis and an adaptive management framework. Bush Heritage Australia has spread the risk of extinction by diversifying our conservation approach to include protecting habitat by installing feral fish exclusion fencing, translocation to establish new populations, and management of a captive breeding program. A current focus of management of red-finned blue-eye is assessing and conserving the remaining genetic diversity in order to maintain viable populations. Question driven data analysis has allowed us to model the best approach for capturing and maintaining genetic diversity in translocated and captive populations. The outcomes of this research directly translate into our conservation strategy and on-ground management actions. On-going monitoring, data collection and analysis allow us to assess the outcomes of these actions, and to continue to inform and shape our management approach.

"If you don't know where you are going, you'll probably end up somewhere else." – Lewis Carroll

The Tasmanian Land Conservancy (TLC) is a not-for-profit, community and science-based organisation which has grown to become one of Tasmania’s largest private landholders, managing 20 permanent reserves and 30,000 ha across the state. In 2013, the TLC began installing ecological monitoring across its reserved land with the aim of informing on-ground management.

For each of the ecological indicators measured, we have attempted to define a target or reference value in order to quantify current ecological condition. In this presentation we discuss the challenges encountered in assigning reference condition including problems. These include avoiding ‘shifting benchmarks’, accounting for natural variation at different spatial and temporal scales, and the lack of consistent data at broad scales.

We adopted a tiered approach to the definition and use of conservation targets, based on the reliability of available information. Coarse but robust indicators such as the extent of native vegetation and observed vs expected fauna species were readily compared to a standard (e.g. pre-European) reference. These measures are useful for comparing condition and prioritising resources across different reserves but provide only coarse inputs to adaptive management feedbacks. In contrast, detailed indicators such as activity levels of individual fauna species were difficult to compare to a standard reference but are critical for assessing their change over time and the impact of our management interventions.

Many conservation interventions involve trying to reduce the impact of predation on the most vulnerable stage of an endangered animal. A novel conservation intervention for both sea turtles and ground-nesting birds faced with over-predation, is CTA (conditioned taste aversion) that attempts to teach predators that eggs or nests are somehow distasteful or poisonous. This practice can involve coating eggs or dummy eggs with a chemical, spraying chemicals on the surface of the nest, or lying or burying dead poisonous animals in or around the nest. In 2018, we trialled CTA on the introduced sugar gliders Petaurus breviceps of Tasmania. Predation of eggs and incubating adult swift parrots Lathamus discolor by sugar gliders is one of the key threatening processes affecting swift parrots during the nesting period. At two sites previously used by swift parrots, we assessed predation rates by leaving fresh quail eggs in nest boxes for two weeks, then injected quail eggs with the distasteful chemical thiabendazole and left those eggs for two weeks, and then, two weeks later, placed fresh quail eggs in the nest boxes to determine predation rates after CTA. At both sites, CTA successfully reduced egg predation. We recommend that CTA be used in conjunction with other management actions (lethal control of sugar gliders, ‘Possum Keeper Outerers’ nest boxes, habitat protection) to decrease predation by sugar gliders.

Threatened species recovery programs are increasingly turning to reintroductions to reverse biodiversity loss. Here we present a real-world example where adopting tactics (techniques which influence post-release performance and persistence), and an adaptive management framework (which incorporates feedback between monitoring and future actions) can improve reintroduction success.

In a series of trials we investigated the influence of tactics on the effective survival and post-release dispersal of endangered eastern quolls (Dasyurus viverrinus) reintroduced into Mulligans Flat Woodland Sanctuary, ACT. Founders were monitored for 42 days post-release, and survival was tested against trial, sex, origin, presence of pouch young, den sharing, and post-release dispersal. We adopted an adaptive management framework, using monitoring to facilitate rapid learning and to implement interventions that improved reintroduction success.

Founders released in austral autumn 2016 were less likely to survive (Trial 1, 28.6%) than those founders released in austral winter 2017 (Trial 2, 76.9%) and 2018 (Trial 3, 87.5%). We adapted several tactics in Trials 2 and 3, including the selection of female-only founders to avoid elevated male mortality, and post-mating releases to reduce stress. Founders that moved dens between consecutive nights were less likely to survive, suggesting that minimising post-release dispersal can increase the likelihood of survival. The probability of moving dens was lower in Trials 2 and 3, for females, and when den sharing with another founder. This study demonstrates that, through iterative trials of tactics involving monitoring and learning, adaptive management can be used to significantly improve the success of reintroduction programs.

The Wannon River Delta, a 13-km2 wetland complex at the base of the Grampians, has suffered long-term degradation. A program to address this was challenging but successful. Major alterations to the wetlands had occurred due to drainage, farming and plantation forestry. Past restoration attempts had failed due to perceived risks by landholders (both public and private). The long-term vision and effort of the Hamilton Field Naturalists Group, a park ranger, an environmental NGO Nature Glenelg Trust (NGT) and Glenelg Hopkins Catchment Management Authority (GHCMA) were crucial to this complex’s successful restoration. Support, resilience, patience and cooperation between all groups were required. The flexibility, resourcefulness and independence of NGT was crucial in addressing the complex land tenures, on-ground restoration and ongoing management.
Over the medium-term success required NGT and GHCMA partnering and maximising opportunities as they arose. Initially GHCMA and state grants to NGT allowed trial hydrological restorations as well as the part purchase of a wetland in the complex, bed restoration and hydrological assessment. Subsequently NGT were able to leverage this support to gain further funding, including crowd sourcing the purchase of the remainder of the wetland. The ability of NGT to hold land tenure was a key element in the program.
The complex had undergone 150 years of modification and the complexity and variety of past damage and nature of ongoing threats required a range of organisational, social and technical innovations to successfully carry out the restoration.

Adaptive management can be a great tool for practitioners of natural areas when robust long-term monitoring informs on-ground management decisions. Since 1996, when the Striped Legless Lizard (Delma impar) was formally declared as vulnerable, the ACT Government has used an adaptive management program to address the conservation requirements for this species.

Over the last four years (2015-2018) this program has expanded monitoring to include additional measures of vegetation structure that have a known association with habitat quality. The aim of this monitoring is to track populations of the species and changes in habitat quality, particularly relating to grazing and fire. Monitoring focussed on five urban reserves which protect Natural Temperate Grasslands in the ACT. Monitoring involves checking artificial shelters (concrete roof tiles) placed at permanent monitoring plots, multiple times yearly, coinciding with peak activity for the Striped Legless Lizard.

Over four years we have recorded a 66% decline in the number of Striped Legless Lizards across all sites. We also measured a 31% decline in grass height over that time, with most sites now outside the critical range that has been demonstrated as the preferred habitat structure for the species. The causes of this decrease are being further investigated and likely relate to overgrazing by native herbivores and dry seasonal conditions. These results have triggered some appropriate management responses and demonstrates the need for continued monitoring. The on-going partnership between long-term monitoring and management to inform true adaptive management is critical to adequately conserving Striped Legless Lizard in the ACT.