TThe closure to the cat test falls from a transparent cliff on one side of the island of Kangaroo and disappears in the ocean on the other. The upper section is disquketing and electrified – a coarse shock for cunning cats that seek to climb – and the bottom is at the Terrier test.
The gaps left for humans and fauna align all potential intruders through a field of trap mine, which are closely monitored.
The program of eradication of the peninsula of the 38,000 hectare peninsula of the island of Kangaroo, managed by Ki Landscape Board (Kilb), decimated the population of wild cats of the island from a summit of about 1,600 to around 150, although it is difficult to pin specific numbers.
Cat detection dogs, drones, artificial intelligence and thermal optics all play a role, as is the feline hotline, where residents can report a cat observation.
Nationally, wild cats kill more than 1.5 billion native mammals, birds, reptiles and frogs and 1.1 billion invertebrates per year. They contributed to the extinction of more than 20 Australian mammals and can spread diseases to native animals, livestock and humans.
On Kangaroo Island, they threatened threatened animals like Kangaroo Dunnart Island and the South Brown Bandicoot.
The risk of catching a domestic cat by accident is low on the island of Kangaroo, which has laws on the strictest domestic cats in Australia. Cats, which must be kept inside or in a contained execution, must also be recorded, micropupités and deexed.
All wild -trapped cats are also checked for a micropuce.
Jack Gough, Director of plea of the invasive species Council and Expert CAT, says that if the program succeeds, it would be the greatest cat eradication on an island populated by the world.
It would also be proof of concept that could deploy more widely. The closure to the 3 km cat test separates the Dudley peninsula from the rest of the island, where there are more people – and cats.
Gough says they are at a “critical moment” of the program, and a winter blitz is necessary.
“When the figures are high, get rid of it is easier. As they drop, it becomes more difficult. This is where eradications tend to succeed or fail, ”he says.
“Once and do, it’s how you do it. Or they reproduce, and it risks eradication.”
Risks of bird flu compounds
Wild cats also constitute a threat to sea lions and penguins, warns Gouth.
“On Ki, cats are a threat to the survival of babies lion of sea due to toxoplasmosisAnd penguins in terms of predicts of their nests, ”he says.
Both are sensitive to the bird flu.
Australia is preparing for the possibility of an H5N1 epidemic. It is not yet there, but the bird flu abroad has already proven fatal to seals and penguins.
“The construction of the resilience of these species, knowing that the bird flu could arise, is a key element,” explains Gouth.
“”[Bird flu] could be a level of extinction event [for sea lions and penguins]. “”
He says the program needs an “immediate injection” of $ 1.93 million for this blitz. The Council wrote to the Minister of the Environment, Tanya PliberSak, requesting a commitment of around $ 6.2 million over three years, and this $ 1.93 million now.
A spokesperson for Plibersek said the government was “eager to see wild cats eradicated on the island”.
“We will continue to work with the government and the community of the South Australian to achieve this,” said the spokesperson.
“Wild cats are dangerous and ruthless predators, pushing our native species threatened like the largest Bilby, Numbat and Gilbert Potoroo, to the edge of extinction.”
The spokesman said the government had invested more than $ 60 million in 55 projects to control wild cats, including more than $ 3 million for Kangaroo Island.
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AI used in the high -tech plan
Over 270 wildlife cameras capture images of cats while lurking the island every day. Tens of thousands of images are downloaded and treated with artificial intelligences, which distinguish cats from kangaroos and other wild animals before a human took control of categorization.
Finally, as it learns and the number of cats decreases, AI can detect individual cats.
Hundreds of cages and leg traps through the Dudley are equipped with sensors, making people know when something is inside. Eradication agents say that you can immediately say that a cat in a trap is wild by its devoid teeth and his whistling.
The Brenton Florence elite shooter worked to eradicate the wild goat, deer and pigs on the island. To fight against cats, the control officer of wild animals made a robot that his colleagues joke to the child in love with Squeaky of Johnson and friends and Dexter of the perfect match.
It uses thermal optics in search of heat signals and lasers to navigate. He named it “Cache-et-levi Even Mark II”.
Florence also gets a new drone that will find cats using thermal imagery. Then, he can handle them, keep them away from the scrub with the help of an integrated speaker and lower the hooks to place food or a lure perfume.
Bluetick Coonhounds Murra and Jager, rose to follow animals and trained to catch cats, help hunting.
Mayo deputy, Rebekha Sharkie, talks about the devastation of black summer bush fires 2019-20, when a third of the island burned. At the national level, a billion animals are dead, including on Ki.
“We lose the same quantity each year with wild cats and we raise our shoulders as a nation,” she says.
“Ki is doing a great job. It was a slow process to do well, but it is bearing fruit now.
“We are concerned about the loss of species. We all have to put our shoulders on the wheel programs and finance that work to eradicate wild cats – and, I would add, the foxes. ”
The opposition environment spokesman Jonno Duniam said that the coalition had created the national working group of wild cats in 2015 when he was in government, and accused the work of doing a “song and dancing on a” war on cats “without” appropriate follow-up “.
The farmer Tom Willson says that since the start of eradication, his sheep have had fewer parasites – cats transmit sarcocystis via their excrement. This does not affect their health, but slaughterhouses will not accept sheep which are infected due to time and cost to cut it from meat.
Once the cats are eradicated, the sheep will no longer set sarcocystis, he said, adding that he has already seen a cat for two years.
Paul Jennings is the team leader of the Kilb Wild Cat Eradication Program. He says that wild populations are starting to flourish, seen through their cameras and heard via anecdotes. People who have spent their whole life in the peninsula report by seeing more nesting birds like the Bush-Pierre Curlew, he said.
“A landowner said last week that it was the first time he has seen a pygmy posum in his whole life,” said Jennings.
He says they have not yet seen any recovery in number of native bandages, and cats can be the “last straw” when animals were affected by bush fires, loss of habitat and other threats.
“But nature is extremely resilient,” he says.
“Give him a half-chance and it will come back.”
