BDBSA Project Metadata Detail

Survey/Project Number: 227          Total No. of Sites: 210
Survey/Project Name: Carpet Pythons in the Riverland
Abstract: DEH received a Wildlife Conservation Fund Grant for this project to map the recent and current distribution of Carpet pythons in the riverland and for public awareness. Questionares and information brochures were sent to landholders to determine where the Carpet Pythons had been sighted. The current locations of Carpet Pythons were then visited and the habitat was described.
 
Start Date: 01/01/1900      End Date: 01/01/2015
Survey Type: Fauna only
   
Study Area Description: *** No study area description recorded
Objectives
         Vegetation: *** No vegetation survey objectives recorded
         Fauna: To map the current and recent distribution of Carpet Pythons using information from landholders. Also to increase understanding of Carpet python habitat usage in the Riverland.
Methodology
         Vegetation: *** No vegetation methodology recorded
         Fauna: Two mail surveys in 2002 and 2006 were used to gain fundamental distribution information about the Carpet Python in the SA Murray-Darling Basin. The surveys used a mail questionnaire to gather information on current and recent occupancy of the species through landholders' sighting reports. The 2006 mail survey refined the methods of the 2002 survey. Questionnaires were mailed on April 28, 2006 to nine hundred (900) holders of water licences (both Central Irrigation Trust (CIT) and private irrigators). Of the 190 respondents that returned a questionnaire, 116 (61%) reported never to have sighted a python, and 74 (39%) reported at least one python sighting either on their property or somewhere else. In total, there were 110 accounts of python sightings from the survey-the majority sighted prior to 1995 (Treilibs 2006). The mail survey established a solid basis for a current and recent distribution of the species. Reports of sightings are ongoing, and continue to be collated into a sightings database.

Data Distribution Rules: Public Dataset
Project Basis: Vegetation : Fauna species/population Study (ie trapping records over time period for species study). NOTE:NON Std Svy methodology may have been used.
Information Authority: Department for Environment and Heritage (BDBSA:Murraylands) - Regional Ecologist