A Waurn Ponds professor is helping a duck tracking research project take flight alongside the Game Management Authority (GMA).
The research will involve attaching small solar-powered satellite tracking devices to over 400 individual game ducks from four game duck species over three years.
GMA Research Principal Dr Jason Flesch said the lightweight trackers will help “record how long game ducks survive”, along with the ducks’ location, movement, breeding, feeding and resting patterns.
“This project aims to identify the drivers of game duck movement in relation to fluctuating environmental conditions, including water availability, in the Australian landscape,” he said.
“This vital knowledge will be used with other research to inform Adaptive Harvest Management of game ducks in Victoria, which is being implemented to ensure duck hunting in Victoria remains sustainable.”
Deakin University Waurn Ponds Professor Marcel Klaassen said the benefits of the research went beyond hunting as it would provide a greater understanding of duck movements and potential diseases.
“We will, for instance, be able to predict how the highly pathogenic form of avian influenza, currently impacting wildlife and poultry populations globally, may spread should it arrive in Australia,” he said.
The research started in June this year and will continue until 2028, with close to 60 ducks currently fitted with the trackers across the pacific black duck, Australian wood duck, grey teal and chestnut teal species.
Visit shorturl.at/DjUcy to follow the research progress and to see where ducks are travelling.
