​Flying-fox movement ecology

How and why animals move across the planet has fascinated humankind since time immemorial. However, until recently, progress in movement research has been slow due to technological limitations and a lack of consistent methodology. Current research focuses on understanding the underlying causes of movement patterns and their ecological and evolutionary consequence; however, a key challenge is to integrate our understanding of movement across different spatiotemporal scales in single systems. Multi-scale investigations are crucial for a fundamental understanding of the causes and consequences of animal movement, and are key for managing our biodiversity under anthropogenic environmental change.
​Flying-foxes are charismatic bats found across the Old World and Australia. They are the most mobile mammals on earth by most measures, and ideal models for studying movement across a wide range of spatiotemporal scales. Flying-fox movements range from small relocations within colonies and foraging sites, to nightly foraging trips of up to 80 km, to long-distance nomadism covering thousands of kilometres across up to 16 degrees of latitude in a single year. 
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Nomadic movements of an adult female grey-headed flying-fox, tracked over a period of five years. J. Martin & J. A. Welbergen, unpublished
​Their extreme mobility makes flying-foxes key long-distance pollen and seed dispersers in Australia’s fragmented forest ecosystems, and enables their successful exploitation of the unpredictable resource environment of this country. However, it also puts them in frequent conflict with humans in urban environments, a conflict made worse by several emerging zoonotic diseases that flying-foxes are known to carry. Understanding how and why flying-foxes move across different spatiotemporal scales is crucial for the management of the species, the habitats in which it lives, and the trajectory of new emerging diseases. Recent advances in tracking technology and remote-sensing, combined with detailed long-term monitoring of flying-foxes colonies across their distribution, makes it possible - for the first time - to investigate movement from local to continental scales in a single animal system.​

Aims & Objectives

​THE OVERARCHING AIM OF THIS RESEARCH IS TO DEVELOP A MECHANISTIC UNDERSTANDING OF THE MOVEMENT ECOLOGY OF FLYING-FOXES, FROM LOCAL TO CONTINENTAL SCALES.
To make this ambitious aim tractable, our research program will focus on the following two areas of research:

  • How do flying-foxes navigate?
  • What are the drivers of flying-fox movements?

With this project we will address key issues in the field of movement research, and provide much-needed scientific underpinnings for policy and management of Australia's flying-foxes and other mobile species.
​Our approach will be guided by the emerging paradigm of ‘movement ecology’ that focuses on identifying behaviour from tracking data and revealing the mechanisms that drive patterns of movement. Our methodology involves innovative experimental manipulation, designed to determine how flying-foxes navigate, and data from cutting edge GPS/biotelemetry technology, satellite telemetry, and Doppler radar. Combined with the latest analytical techniques, these will enable us to determine the intrinsic (i.e. physiological) and environmental factors that govern flying-fox movements. We are in the unique position that we already have at our disposal the biotelemetry technology, and the extensive GPS, satellite and Doppler radar data required to successfully complete this project.

Research Team

Our Research Program brings together a multi-institutional team comprising the following people:​

Current Student Projects

References

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