Western Tracks Collaring project

The average weight of the collared female wild dogs was 15.6 kg and males 19.2 kg.

From the collared wild dogs, it was found that 630 km² is an average home range in their landscape, but animals can have activity areas up to 1,300 km². Large distances were covered by the collared dogs, with an average of 15 km per day.

These figures are significantly greater than that of animals on the east coast. These factors undoubtedly show the importance of coordinated and strategic broadscale control across the landscape.

The change in seasons didn’t drastically change the movement patterns. It was found that these animals were most active during the early morning and evening hours. The exception being summer, where the most activity was during the night.

A major finding was that the collared wild dogs GPS signals placed them twice as likely to be near a drainage depression than anywhere else in the landscape. This has showed that the collared animals preferred to travel the landscape in these depressions which possess either cover, shade, softer surface to travel across or a mix of all these factors.

While there was minimal data in relation to the locations of bait placements, the data that was collected showed an interaction between the baits placed by the landholder and a collared dog. This data was collected using the control feature within FeralScan.

One collared dog was recorded crossing over the bait trail numerous times, even visiting exact bait locations for three days before it finally succumbed to a bait. This data not only proved that wild dogs do take baits but also showed why it is so important to have baits available in the landscape for pest animals to take, particularly since they aren’t always confident to take a bait on first inspection.

The collared dogs also showed that wild dogs that aren’t in a pack together can utilise the same space within a landscape, just at a different time. This is helpful to understand as quite often there isn’t one pest animal to target, but multiples. 

The 42 collared pigs in this project which focused on landscapes along the Paroo River and associated flood-out areas had a home range average of 91.7 km². Sows had an average home range of 40.6 km2 and boars 121.5 km² and where they moved around the landscape depended on the season.

The GPS collars recorded the pigs’ location every half hour. The space between GPS points was greater in winter than it was in summer, which shows the animals heavily reliance on water and shade resources.

In winter the days are cooler, which allowed the pigs more ideal weather to travel about the landscape in search of food. On average, pigs travelled 5.27 km per day with only a marginal difference between boars (6 km) and sows (4.1 km).

The collaring data provided insight into the animal's home range and core home ranges. An animal's core home range provides an opportunity to locate your control efforts in an area where you are more likely to achieve good results. The average core home range was 18.8 km².

Understanding the features of a home and core home range assists landholders across the region to identify similar areas on their property and undertake control activities.