SARA RFI - Ecological Assessment Report

Koala survey report – Serenity Close, Noosa Heads
Prepared for Litoria Consulting


3.0       SURVEY RESULTS

3.1       FINDINGS

The field survey was conducted on 20 April 2023.

The detection dog traveled a total of 5.3km across the site while actively searching for targets
(see Figure 2). This is a highly intensive search effort for such a small site of only 2.4ha, which
guarantees that the detection dog perceived and analysed at least once the volatile scent
molecules emanating from the forest floor & tree canopies of the entirety of the subject site. One
formal FQC was successfully performed and is displayed on Figure 2. Target scats were placed
at another location by the field assistant at one additional location on the site to show the client
how OWAD’s detection dogs indicate, however it was not recorded as an FQC because it violated
a key principle of formal FQCs (i.e. even through the handler didn’t know the location of the target
sample, the handler did know that a sample had been placed hence violating the temporal
requirement).

No naturally occurring Koala scats and no live Koala were detected during this survey.

3.2       INTERPRETATION AND DISCUSSION

Given the very intensive search effort applied here and the fact that no evidence of Koala
presence was detected, it can confidently be stated that the site does not currently form part of
the home range of any individual Koala. Indeed, Koalas typically produce between 100 and 150
scats per 24h, typically scattered in different spots in any given patch (following the Koala’s
movements over any given period). If a single Koala had visited the site even for as little as a day
or so in recent months, there would have therefore been ample evidence for the detection dog to
find.

would drop about 1,000 scats in a week and the probability for such evidence to be completely
deteriorated or flush away by the rain in the last few months is low. Further, there was no evidence
to suggest that any migrating Koala individual has recently visited the site.

At current in Australia, there is only one single formal document that prescribes detection dog
search effort required for Koala detection (the NSW Government Biodiversity Assessment Method
Survey Guide5). However, OWAD rejects the prescription of this guide. Indeed, in OWAD’s
experience as Koala conservation experts and professional field detection canine handlers, the
minimum survey effort prescribed by this guide results in an unacceptably high risk of ‘false
negative’, and therefore likely to result in poorly-informed land use/planning decisions. According
to the NSW guide, this site would have required only 400m of detection dog search effort to
confirm Koala absence which OWAD considers severely insufficient. Unless and until an
adequate formal guide may be published, OWAD relies on its experience and on its own
standards of scientific rigour to determine adequate search effort for any given study.

In OWAD’s extensive experience, detecting evidence of Koala presence where they occur at low-
densities and/or where the site is only occasionally visited for short periods by migrating



      5   https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/-/media/OEH/Corporate-Site/Documents/Animals-and-
          plants/Threatened-species/koala-phascolarctos-cinereus-biodiversity-assessment-method-survey-guide-
          220249.pdf

OWAD Environment                                                                                          Page 6