ABSTRACT We have never been able to rest our country. Pastoralists could move the sheep or the cattle from the paddock, but 61 per cent of the grazing by goats and kangaroos remains. This continual grazing of the most valuable plant species, to their local extinction, has left the land unproductive and bleeding. The dingo has allowed this landscape to be effectively rested for the first time in 130 years because, in the past 10 to 15 years, the dingoes have entirely removed the goats from Wooleen and almost entirely removed them from the Murchison, Gascoyne and Goldfields districts. But that's not the half of it, I estimate the dingoes have also removed 80 to 90 per cent of the kangaroo population. So overall, a 50 to 55 per cent reduction in grazing pressure over the great majority of an area larger than France, in the last 12 years. A stupendous achievement. Dingoes give us the opportunity for the first time in 130 years to manage the unmanageable. Without them, the supposedly renewable resource that is the southern rangelands can only continue its downward spiral.

ABSTRACT As we enter an era of global mass extinctions, it is important to tackle wildlife research and conservation from multiple fronts, including those made available by wildlife organisations, zoos and sanctuaries. Captive studies are particularly useful when studying free-ranging populations is difficult, and/or when controlled conditions are required. Yet, despite the significant role that they play in supporting research and conservation of species and ecosystems, they are rarely recognised in the scientific literature. Here we present a case study of the Australian Dingo Foundation (ADF), a private organisation and captive breeding facility that actively supports research and conservation efforts relating to the dingo ( Canis dingo ). Over the past decade (2010 to 2020), the ADF has facilitated research across eight research disciplines that include archaeology, behaviour, biology, cognition, evolutionary psychology, non-lethal management, reproduction and parental behaviour, and vocalisations. This has resulted in at least 21 published scientific studies which are summarised in this paper. As this case study demonstrates, captive facilities have the potential to contribute to the understanding and conservation of dingoes by providing practical alternatives to, and/or supplement studies of free-ranging populations. We conclude by outlining some of the implications and limitations of conducting research using captive dingo populations.

ABSTRACT The impact of hybridisation between dingoes and domestic dogs, and the subsequent introgression of domestic dog genes into dingo populations, remains a topic of significant impact. It has been claimed, but with little evidence or logical argumentation, that dingoes with significant dog introgression have different effects on agriculture and ecosystems than dingoes with no dog introgression. Introgression is a natural process in evolution, occurring in many species, although this is sometimes human assisted. Canid species in particular show high levels of introgression, due to their genetic and phylogenetic similarities, and human persecution creates scenarios encouraging hybridisation. Dingoes are no exception and demonstrate high levels of introgression of domestic dog genes, particularly in the temperate areas of south-eastern Australia. The available evidence shows that this introgression has minimal effects on the functional morphology of the dingo skull. There is also some preliminary evidence that introgression has not had a major impact on dingo reproductive biology. Studies on the impacts of dingoes on arid, tropical and temperate ecosystems, where levels of introgression vary greatly, all show consistent positive impacts of dingoes, regardless of the amount of domestic dog genes within the dingo population, on these ecosystems. Hence, hybridisation and resultant introgression from domestic dog genes appear to have little effect on aspects of the functional morphology or ecological role of the dingo. Accordingly, introgression does not diminish the conservation status of the dingo.

ABSTRACT The term ‘biodiversity’ emerged in the mid-1980s and quickly became sufficiently popular that it could have been viewed as a ‘new field of science’. The broader community has also embraced the term and, ultimately, it has become a proxy for species conservation. As a consequence, conservation of biodiversity has effectively become the only approach to minimising continued species loss. However, despite the widespread use of the term, there is confusion over its definition, even among disciplines to which the term has become a focus. In Australia, much of the biodiversity conservation/restoration is community-driven (e.g., landcare, political pressure of animal welfare groups) with a focus on species and habitat biodiversity. Genetic diversity is seldom seriously considered. As a consequence, native species biodiversity management is often not maximising the potential outcomes. Arguably the greatest issue associated with incorporating genetics more centrally into biodiversity restoration is that its definition is often considered complex. In addition, the negative aspects of ignoring the genetic component of biodiversity may be masked by the positives when the outputs of a program provide many individuals of species considered at risk of extinction despite the longer term outcomes potentially having the opposite effect. To better manage biodiversity restoration all of us who use the term within our discipline need to ensure that, wherever possible, we seek to inform those around us of the importance of genetic biodiversity in biodiversity restoration programs. A first step is to determine a simple, all-encompassing definition of biodiversity that explicitly includes genetics.

Information relating to the early decline of native mammal species in the western third of Australia, before the establishment of rabbits and foxes, was sought from recollections of oldtimers, archival records, historical documents, and searches of museum collections. Based on the information discovered, the hypothesis is advanced that the early decline was caused by an exotic disease. The evidence available is suggestive of a first wave of mammal declines and extinctions in Western Australia (WA) commencing about 1875. From this single, contingent historical event, it is postulated that 33 species (about one third of the non-volant mammal fauna of WA) changed significantly in distribution and abundance. The pattern of the decline both geographically and over time is consistent with epizootic disease as the primary factor, but probably interacting with drought and predation by feral cats as secondary factors. Much of the decline occurred before food shortages or habitat destruction caused by sheep grazing, habitat destruction caused by wheat farming, and changes in Aboriginal fire regimes. Dated and localised records of disease affecting conspicuous (often pest) species, when integrated with other records of early declines, are suggestive of the epizootic spreading rapidly from the Shark Bay district in the 1880s. The lower south-west area was affected last, before 1920. Descriptions of clinical signs are imprecise but do refer to numerous dead or dying animals, mange, alopecia, eye disease, withered ears, and scabs on the nose. Plausible explanations of the source of the disease (south-east Asia), its transmission (mosquitoes), and the pattern and scale of its spread (exceptionally wet summers) are proposed. Other possible vectors are discussed but do not adequately explain the pattern and scale of the spread. Many other early declines of mammal species in WA that are difficult to explain convincingly may have been influenced by this epizootic. Disease as a primary factor is considered to provide a more satisfactory explanation of early declines in WA than predation by feral cats. Impacts of these declines on ecosystem processes were likely to have been profound. The applicability of the conceptual model developed is discussed in relation to the early decline of some mammal species in eastern Australia, The need for ongoing, vigilant quarantine to minimise the risk of animal diseases being introduced is emphasised.

The short-beaked echidna ( Tachyglossus aculeatus ) is an exceptionally long-living mammal having a maximal lifespan of ~50 years. This is about four times that predicted from its body mass and, consequently, its longevity quotient is ~4. This longevity quotient is similar to two other exceptionally long-living mammalian species; the naked mole-rat ( Heterocephalus glaber ) and Homo sapiens . In recent times, the types of fats that make up cellular membrane have been implicated in the determination of a species' maximum lifespan. This modification of the oxidative stress theory of aging, which has been called the membrane pacemaker theory of aging, derives from the fact that polyunsaturated fats are very susceptible to lipid peroxidation whereas monounsaturated fats are resistant to peroxidation. As a test of the theory we measured the fatty acid composition of membrane lipids isolated from tissues of echidnas. We found that, as in the other long-living mammals, echidna membranes are more monounsaturated and less polyunsaturated than would be predicted from their body size and that the peroxidation index of their membrane lipids is what their maximum longevity would predict.

This paper traces the post World War II debate over kangaroo management, and how the various parties have managed the issue to arrive at the current levels of kangaroo harvest, with particular reference to NSW and the transition of policy from culling kangaroos as an agricultural pest to a commercial harvest as the principal driver. Kangaroos have been variously represented in the debate as pests, a commercial resource, an iconic Australian symbol, and endangered species. In 1958, kangaroos narrowly survived a pastoralists' vote to list them as noxious animals. If it had passed, and been agreed upon by State Cabinet, it would have made it compulsory for landowners to rid their land of these animals because they would then have been noxious species. Over 1964 and 1965, culled kangaroo populations crashed during drought. It showed that for kangaroo management to be effective in the long-term the original tenet in the Fauna Protection Act 1948 of kangaroos as pests had to be re-interpreted and, in Allen Strom's words: “kangaroos needed to be managed on a sustained yield basis.” Fifty years later the debate is better informed, with a sustainable population management approach, which includes commercial harvesting. In a statement on the subject in 1983, Neil Shepherd provided the certainty as to what was underpinning the kangaroo management program at that time: “Commercial harvesting is sanctioned by wildlife authorities to reduce the impact of kangaroos on agriculture. Management for conservation is the primary objective and the harvest industry has no right to exist independent of the conservation program.” He also concluded that farming kangaroos was not feasible, and pointed out that they have never been intensively farmed. What was needed by the late 1980s was an effective advocate who could put the material together into a persuasive argument to move the public sentiment from pest management to sustained yield. If it had been attempted 10-20 years earlier, Shepherd observed, it would have been unsuccessful because the science to support the proposition, the research driven by Graeme Caughley from the mid 1970s to 1987, had not been undertaken. An advocate of a change in policy was Gordon Grigg. His proposal, first published in 1987, was to substitute kangaroo harvesting for sheep farming on the sheep rangelands as an answer to both widespread land degradation and sustainable kangaroo management. Grigg later gave it the epigrammatic description of “sheep replacement therapy”.The modern debate now centres on matters of ethics and animal welfare on the one hand, and conservation management policies on the other. A report in 1998 into the Commercial Utilisation of Australia Native Wildlife concluded “that it is a legitimate activity of the Federal Government to support an export industry based on the commercial harvesting of kangaroos, which is being prejudiced overseas by public campaigns based on false information.” Peter Singer, in 2005, took the view that “Those who see kangaroos only as a resource, overlook the ethical aspects of how we are treating other sentient beings.” In their 2006 review of the NSW Kangaroo Management Program, Olsen and Low concluded that shooting remains the most economical, humane and cost-effective way to cull/harvest kangaroos; rainfall is the overriding driver of population density and that the current harvest strategy (15-17%) appears to be achieving its current twin goals of sustainable use of natural resources and the maintenance of viable populations of the four harvested species. Thus the debate continues. However, this history of the debate on the commercial harvesting of kangaroos has revealed that it has been long running, filled with strong arguments and strong players, and that science and policy have had a long struggle to assimilate the needs of the other. The 2007-2011 NSW kangaroo management plan is titled New South Wales Commercial Kangaroo Harvest Management Plan . This bold title acknowledges the change in management outlook from damage mitigation to sustainable use. The historical record also demonstrates that the current NSW management plan, which is underpinned by an objective to manage a sustainable kangaroo harvest, is the outcome of a long and public debate.