Tiger Quolls and Conservation Dogs

Wild Tiger Quolls were thought to have died out in the Otways for nearly 10 years until the discovery in 2012 of scat (droppings) near Lorne and Cape Otway. This was followed by further evidence, including several images collected by Parks Victoria during regular fauna monitoring with infra-red cameras. 

Since then, the Conservation Ecology Centre has been working on a number of projects to safeguard the future of Tiger Quolls, including habitat restoration, fox control, and training a team of community volunteers and their dogs to detect Tiger Quoll scats. 

The Otways Conservation Dogs was an exciting program sniffing out the endangered species of the Otways. Working with Canidae Development we trained up a team of community volunteers to work with their own dogs (across a wide range of breeds), to detect scats of endangered species.

These highly qualified endangered species detection teams use Minimal Impact Detection Methods to detect scats on both private and public land throughout the Otways (and beyond!).

Initially, our aim was to train conservation detection dogs to locate Tiger Quoll scats and use DNA analysis to increase our understanding of the Tiger Quoll (which were rediscovered in the Otways in 2012) and more effectively target conservation efforts such as invasive species control and habitat reconnection.

In 2015, our dogs positively identified an old quoll scat in the Cumberland Valley. Unfortunately, the scat was too old to provide further information from its DNA, but the concept had been proven.

And from 2017, the dogs were trained to detect Long-nosed Potoroos.