SuperSites Data Portal

The sampling site consists of a 1km transect with 6 survey points, each point at every 200m interval.

30 minute, 150m transects will be carried out at each sampling point along the 1km transect. We will walk into the forest at each point, using a hip-chain to measure distance, and record all bird species that we see and hear. The sampling method has been standardised to enable comparisons of data collected at this point from year to year and season to season and across the altitudinal gradient. When recording data, we use codes to denote a bird’s position (if we know it) and the certainty of the sighting.

30 minute searches of the area around each 6 points along the 1km transect are undertaken and time is divided between looking on the forest floor (often in sun spots), on the trunks of trees and under logs. Usually about ten minutes of this is spent along the roadside looking for leaf-litter skinks before moving off into the forest. We tend to operate in no more than a 50m radius of the point itself. Our aim is to collect data on any reptiles (and occasionally frogs and other animals) that we see. Reptiles will be held in individual plastic bags, which will be labelled with the site details (e.g. LU7A1). Bags will be taken to a central measuring point (sometimes camp) and animals will be weighed, measured and a DNA sample collected. They will later be returned to their capture site and released.

2014 Note: Standardised reptiling surveys have not been conducted in 2014 as analyses have indicated that new data is no longer value adding. Moreover, the variability in standardised reptile surveys is high and they are not proving to be as useful for the status and trends approach. In replacement of reptile sampling, a monitoring technique looking at a new aspect of thermal heterogeneity with thermal imaging cameras will be used. This new monitoring technique has been trailed in a project funded externally through collaboration with Dave Edwards (University of Sheffield) and we are now expanding this technique into the AWT by including it in upcoming research trips (NERP and Earthwatch).

Each 6 sampling points along the 1km transect will be surveyed for all calling Microhylid Frogs species that can be heard within an estimated 50 m radius.

Our aim when spotlighting is to collect data on nocturnal mammals, geckos and any other animals that may be present. We walk along the 1km transect ideally from point 1 to point 6 and record anything that we see in our spotlight beam and anything that we hear (maybe owls, bats or frogs). It should take from 40 minutes to about an hour to complete the survey. The aim is not to record every single animal present but to get a representative sample. Typically one person walks about 10m ahead of the rest of the group with a spotlight and mainly searches the trees for eye shine from possums. The rest of the group uses head-torches to search the tree trunks for geckos, and the forest floor for frogs and other marsupials and rodents.

Leaf litter is collected and sampled for ants using the Winkler method at 2 selected sites along a 50m transect leading into the forest from each 6 points along the 1 km transect. The leaf litter samples are brought back to camp and placed in Winkler bags for 48hours and ants are collected in beakers filled with Ethanol.

In addition, 20 small, baited plastic vials are also used as to sample ground dwelling as well as arboreal ants. 1 baited vial is placed on the ground and 1 is tied to a tree stem at every 5m along a 50 m transect leading into the forest from each 6 sampling points along the 1km transect. The vials are collected after 1 hour and filled with ethanol.