CESAR Consultants were recently engaged by National Parks Australia to carry out a biomonitoring program to assess the short and longer term effects on non-target species of an aerial baiting program for yellow crazy ants on Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean.
Since human settlement in the 1900’s, the unique ecosystem on Christmas Island has seen the introduction of the exotic yellow crazy ant, a species that can have large impacts on native flora and fauna and therefore pose a major threat to the islands ecosystem.
The yellow crazy ant remained in relatively low densities until 1989, when the first supercolony containing multiple queen ants was discovered. These supercolonies have spread rapidly and in 2001 they occupied approximately 20% of the islands rainforests.
Major changes in the islands rainforest have resulted from these ants, as they have displaced many of the islands fauna such as the islands endemic red land crabs.
Baiting programs (using an insecticide solid bait) have been used to control the yellow crazy ant since 2000, with a large scale aerial baiting program conducted in 2002. This baiting program resulted in a dramatic decrease in yellow crazy ant abundance within weeks. Unfortunately, however, ant numbers have returned to similar levels with supercolonies estimated to cover approximately 1500 ha of rainforest on the island. A further aerial baiting program is planned for September-early October 2009.
CESAR Consultants have been engaged to monitor the effects of this baiting program on non-target species. Our staff will be carrying out invertebrate sampling in both terrestrial and freshwater environments on the island on a number of occasions, both before and after the aerial baiting takes place. This project will determine if the baiting program has any side effects to other fauna on the island, so that future baiting programs can be modified taking these results into consideration.
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