Dr David Hamilton

A marsupial pouch full of tiny, pink eastern quolls. Their distinctive spotted pelage is starting to become apparent

Quoll beans!!

These tiny eastern quolls are only around 5 weeks old, & just starting to get their spots

#GardensforWildlife members, here is a survey just for you! Your garden is the missing link in a new @utas.edu.au Honours research project. Honours student Millicent Biggs is studying how backyard gardens support #Tasmanian #wildlife. Start the survey here: lnkd.in/gChGeTAa

Please enjoy this antechinus sproinging* away

* technical term

Cryptic Kultarr: Integrative Taxonomy Reveals Unrecognized Species of Carnivorous Marsupial (Dasyuridae: Antechinomys) in Arid Australia Conservation is impossible if we have not described all of the species we aim to conserve. This paper reviews the taxonomy of the kultarr (Antechinomys laniger) a small arid-zone specialist native to....

The kultarr is officially three species!
So proud of this work and a big thanks to Australia's amazing museum network and my great supervisor team
@kennytravouillon.bsky.social
@reneecatullo.bsky.social
@planigale.bsky.social
bakerecologylab.wordpress.com

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Long-beaked echidnas? Yes please! A cartoon for people who cannot bear any more news about anything dreadful | First Dog on the Moon Let the echidna discourse begin!

Echidnas! Everyone loves echidnas. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

That’s a funky looking EQ - its vibe is all wrong!

A display of taxidermy of several species of Australian mammal, with a big green map of Australia.

A taxidermy eastern quoll. The map on its label suggests the quoll lives in Tasmania (where it still does live today) and the southeast of the mainland (where it became extinct)

You can date a display of Australian mammals by whether the distribution maps recognise recent extinctions. Eastern #quolls went extinct in mainland Australia in the 1960s, but they're still on this historic display at @hunterianglasgow.bsky.social Zoology Museum.
#taxidermy #extinction

Whoops, sorry - that wasn't meant to be the take-home! The captive-bred quolls did great, we just have to refine methods in terms of which individuals are released to help them with breeding. So a focus on juveniles & adults who have bred previously in future, which is exactly what we're doing ☺️

Busy start to #ICCB2025 - sharing @tasland.bsky.social ten year fauna camera data set - pre & post-fire at Five Rivers. Huge shout out to coauthors including @drdevildave.bsky.social & Jo Potts

This work was the result of a great collaboration between @tasland.bsky.social, @utas.edu.au, WWF Australia and the Tasmanian Quoll Conservation Program (made up in part by Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary, Devils@Cradle, East Coast Nature World & Trowunna Wildlife Sanctuary)

A nesting box full of quolls, with both colour morphs (dark & fawn) represented.

Another interesting side finding was the first (that we know of) genetic confirmation of multiple paternity in eastern quolls, with multiple litters found to have been fathered by more than one male quoll!

Useful lessons to be learned from this for future translocations of this species, with a key one being around releasing reproductively naive adult quolls. They were able to survive well in the environment, but may not have been able to translate that to breeding success.

An adult male light-morph eastern quoll about to be released

However, genetic analysis of the next generation found no evidence that any of them had a captive-bred parent!

While we may have missed some juveniles in our sampling, this (at the least) indicates that the captive-bred quolls had lower breeding success than their wild counterparts

An eastern quoll in the hand, after having a small genetic sample taken

We also wanted to examine the genetic effects of the supplementation, so sampled the next generation of quolls post-release.

This was a key part of an Honour's project by Jessica Morrison, who's the lead author on the study

A dark morph eastern quoll darting off

A population supplementation of eastern quolls occurred @tasland.bsky.social's Silver Plains property, to boost a flagging population of this threatened species. Results were encouraging, w/ high survival & low dispersal of captive-bred quolls.

Read about it here - www.publish.csiro.au/AM/AM22011

An eastern quoll peeking out from a nest of dry grass

📣 New quoll science, looking at the genetic outcomes of a translocation of eastern quolls in Tasmania! 🧪🧬

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

🧵Thread below ⬇️

Come chat about quolls, puns, and finding any excuse to draw animals for science at my poster at #ICCB2025

Monday at 4:30 PM - 6:00 PM in Great Hall 3 & 4

See you there!

I imagine so, but I always have gloves on! The tiny one is the antechinus 😊

Dasyurid feet of various sizes! 👣

Tasmanian devil
Spotted-tailed quoll
Swamp antechinus

A person looking to the sky through binoculars, diligently searching for eagles

Success! A wedge-tailed eagle soaring high!

#WhereWhereWedgie 🦅 surveys near Hamilton today -

- 6 (!!) x wedge-tailed eagles
- 1 x white-bellied sea-eagle
- 1 x brown falcon
- 200 cockatoos!!

An excellent day for science!
@catmyoung.bsky.social @clawkins.bsky.social

#citizenscience 🌿🪶🧪 #Tasmania #conservationscience

A Tasmanian devil standing in front of a camera. Suddenly, a poo appears behind it!

That awkward moment when you catch a devil pooping on camera…

In all seriousness, Tasmanian devils make latrines, where lots of individuals will poo in the same area. Then any devil wandering along can have a sniff, & know who’s around 💩

@tasland.bsky.social

A view of a forested valley from a bird hide in Samoa - most wreaths the hilltops

On the trail of the Manumea (tooth-billed pigeon) in Samoa!

@catmyoung.bsky.social

Chat GPT tells me -
If an echidna were casting a vote in the 2025 Australian election—motivated by instincts to protect its habitat, ensure clean air and water, and avoid human-caused extinction—it would most likely lean toward the Greens.

Make good choices today Australia! #auspol

Has anyone asked the echidnas their views on this election? 🎤

I went to an ancient rainforest with 90 artists and lived! Despite my endless cynicism I had a lovely time | First Dog on the Moon I saw the world’s tallest moss and camped beneath a 500-year-old myrtle tree

An exciting adventure in the forest with First Dog on the Moon. Moss! www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I haven’t - I watched S1, but thought they’d moved to NZ. Hope everyone is behaving around the quolls!

A clown car badger trilby knitting needle mood

I’d have to understand it in order to agree/disagree with it! The sentence sounds like it was written by a drunk badger trying to use Chat GPT 😂

… did AI write this? 🫠

Spot on 😊 & he was 132g, so even beat the range!!