Annabel Smith

Managing interactions between fire regimes and invasive plants

A long history of fire has shaped many ecosystems globally, but thousands of species are now threatened with extinction because climate change, inappropriate management and invasive plants are rapidly changing fire regimes. Effective fire management is more complex than simply re- instating a historical fire regime because ecosystems might require a specific initial management regime (e.g. more frequent burning) to re-establish native plant communities and increase their resilience to future invasion. In this project, we will establish an evidence-based management framework for grassy woodlands of southeast Queensland, by evaluating how variation in fire frequency affects the composition and function of native plant communities.

Available student projects

• How do different fire regimes affect plant community composition and the balance between native and exotic species?
• How do different fire regimes affect animal (mammal & invertebrate) community composition and key demographic parameters?
• Does genetic structure and genetic diversity of native and invasive plant species change under different fire regimes?

This project is a collaboration with Dr Shane Campbell.

Funding is available for the running costs of this project and we are accepting applications for honours and PhD projects. Students with a strong academic track record, wishing to pursue PhD studies, can apply for the competitive UQ Graduate School Scholarship.

Please contact me (annabel.smith@uq.edu.au) if you would like to be involved!

Managing agricultural landscapes to maximise insectivore ecosystem services

Pest control costs agricultural industries several billion dollars per year in loss of productivity and direct control costs (McLeod 2016). In Australia for example, farmers spend $25 billion per year on pest control, including insect pests and weeds (Bradshaw et al. 2021). At the same time, biodiversity in farming landscapes is declining (Ward et al. 2022; Ward et al. 2019), and this is accompanied by a decline in the ecosystem services provided by animals such as pest control, nutrient cycling, pollination and seed dispersal (Dangles & Casas 2019; Kremen & Chaplin-Kramer 2007). Healthy, functioning ecosystems containing a broad range of insectivores play a substantial role in pest control as widely documented in North America, Europe (Maine & Boyles 2015; Naranjo et al. 2015; Puig-Montserrat et al. 2020) and Africa (Bohmann et al. 2011; Noer et al. 2012). These services contribute hundreds of billions of dollars annually to the global economy (Porto et al. 2020). Far less research has been conducted on insectivore ecosystem services in Australia, meaning it is still unclear how to optimise key habitat features that support these services while also maximising agricultural productivity (Lentini et al. 2012). For example, many native insectivores are hollow-dependent, but the optimal density of hollow bearing trees in a cropping landscape needed to maintain a full complement of foraging guilds for pollination and pest reduction is unknown. Previous work has found that the maintenance of 30% natural vegetation in the landscape can support bird communities that provide essential ecosystem services for agriculture (Simmonds et al. 2019). However, it is unknown if similar thresholds apply to other pest control agents such as insectivorous bats.

In this study, we aim to compare farming systems (organic vs conventional) and their landscape context (configuration of native vegetation) on the assemblage of insectivore pest controllers in an important farming region of eastern Australia.

Available student projects

• What is the threshold of native vegetation cover required for healthy bat communities?

• Which farming practices related to pesticide use lead to more functionally diverse insectivorous vertebrate/bat communities?

• A diversity of bat foraging guilds will provide the greatest pest control benefits?

This project is a collaboration with Dr April Reside.

Funding is available for the running costs of this project and we are accepting applications for honours and PhD projects. Students with a strong academic track record, wishing to pursue PhD studies, can apply for the competitive UQ Graduate School Scholarship.

Please contact me (annabel.smith@uq.edu.au) if you would like to be involved!