Organisation name
Australian Desert Expeditions
About
Australia’s deserts are some of the world’s most poorly understood landscapes. Despite covering 18% of the mainland, our desert plants, animals, ecosystem processes, and their natural histories are under threat of being lost, before they are even found.
Over the past 14 years ADE has used modern scientific survey techniques, historical benchmarking and traditional knowledge to explore extensively through the most inaccessible and remote regions of central Australia. They have produced indicative, historical and contemporary inventories of the ecology across a range of desert landscapes (e.g. dunefields, woodlands, river systems, stony ranges). Their surveys have provided insights into the relative abundance and habitat association of species, as well as the distribution and extent of threatened species particularly in response to feral animals (cats and foxes), weeds, increased grazing pressures, as well as correlative climatic events (rainfall and fire) under varying land management regimes.
Using an innovative approach, in the tradition of early scientific exploration, their walking expeditions have been key to the discovery of a number of significant palaeontological and archaeological sites, offering insights into processes that have shaped these landscapes through deep time, as well as the transition from traditional aboriginal management practices to the present.
Focus
Scientific and ecological surveys.
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Last updated: October 2022