PARK WATCH Article December 2024 |

Nick Carter describes his research into our enigmatic apex predator, the Powerful Owl

What’s the elevator pitch for your PhD?

In my thesis, I investigated threatening processes such as habitat fragmentation, poisoning, movement barriers and protection discrepancies. This research is now being used to help further conserve Powerful Owls (Ninox strenua) and inform decision-making processes to reduce impacts to individuals and their territories.

Completed as part of the Deakin University Powerful Owl Research Team (DUPORT), my PhD project involved using a mixture of GPS tracking technology and data from deceased owls to investigate how owls responded to various threatening processes across the urban-rural-forest landscape in Victoria.

Powerful Owls (Ninox strenua) are Australia’s largest owl. Unfortunately, they are a threatened apex predator, declining throughout their distribution of mainland south-east/eastern Australia.

Due to their nocturnal, elusive and highly mobile nature, Powerful Owls are extremely difficult to detect and research which means it is also really difficult to ensure that land managers are effectively mitigating impacts and protecting habitat for conservation. Although Powerful Owls are completely reliant on tree cover to survive and establish territories, they are one of the few Australian apex predators that are able to occupy spaces in rural and urban habitat fragmented areas provided enough resources are available. However, does their ability to occupy habitat along the landscape gradient inadvertently also create additional challenges that threaten their survival?

What led you to do this PhD?

I did my Honours research on Powerful Owls back in 2017, and was lucky enough to be offered a PhD position by my supervisors to continue working on them in 2021. Powerful Owls are a seriously awesome and mysterious animal – being able to work with them is truly so special, so how could you say no when offered a position like that?

In between honours and PhD, I worked as an ecological consultant at SMEC Australia. I gained many important data, time management, field and communication skills that really helped make my PhD journey a more enjoyable and easier experience. Gaining those real-world experiences outside of academia  was really important in diversifying my skillset; I was able to start my PhD running and pretty much start fieldwork on day one.

I never really thought that I would undertake a PhD, or that it would be included in my career plan, but I’m so happy that I undertook this experience – and it really helps when you have such an amazing and supportive team.

What challenges have you had to overcome?

Researching the owls themselves was a massive challenge! Their elusive and mysterious nature is one of my favourite aspects of them, but it really can be a massive challenge. It requires a lot of adaptiveness when fieldwork doesn’t necessarily go the way you thought it would.

For example, I was having very little luck during one of my catching seasons and there wasn’t much time left to keep trying in the same spot. So, we decided to completely move study areas, which actually turned out great and were able to catch five owls within a short time frame.

What’s the most interesting thing you’ve learnt so far?

I’ve learnt so much during my PhD and found out some really cool things about the owls and how to support their conservation, so it’s hard to choose just one. Thesis chapter by thesis chapter, I found out that:

Impact assessment tools are data deficient, and legislation has limited capability to protect Powerful Owls due to their use of habitat across multiple tenures, with both of these shortcomings likely contributing further to the species decline.

Powerful Owls are significantly adjusting their spatial and movement behaviour in response to fragmented habitat – as fragmentation increases, so too does home-range sizes, limiting the amount of territories that can occur in a landscape due to lack of habitat and connectivity.

Roads aren’t a movement barrier for Powerful Owls, but they significant adjust their movement patterns to fly over the road network by actively searching for areas of dense tree cover near watercourses to cross roads.

Despite not consuming rodents, Powerful Owls are being exposed to second-generation anticoagulant rodenticide poisoning, establishing a new threatening process for this species.

What impact do you want your research to have?

Throughout my PhD and ecologist career, I really have tried to make my research tangible and applicable to a wide audience of decision-makers, including land managers, government, researchers, industry and community groups. I truly believe that sharing and discussing research and ideas between academic and non-academic stakeholders is integral for species conservation and implementing positive changes in the real-world.

Ideally, I would love for people to be inspired by the research my team has undertaken to do small actions each day to not only help owls, but all the other amazing wildlife that we share our backyards with. Using alternatives to rodenticides and revegetating your property with native trees really does go a long way.

To quote my recently submitted thesis ‘to ensure the continued co-existence with humans and reverse population declines of this threatened species, its integral that as a society, we collectively ‘give a hoot’ and implement effective conservation actions across our dynamically changing landscapes, for the survival of Powerful Owls’.