Predation of southern brown bandicoots Isoodon obesulus by the European red fox Vulpes vulpes in south-east Victoria.

Abstract

PREDATION by European red foxes (Vulpes vulpes) has been identified as at least partially responsible for local declines of populations of many small to medium-sized mammals in Australia and is listed as a ‘key threatening process’ under the Victorian Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act, 1988 and the Federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act, 1999. Foxes occur in large numbers throughout urban, suburban and rural areas where they opportunistically take carrion, small to medium-sized mammals, birds, insects and fruit (Menkhorst 1995; Marks and Bloomfield 1999). They also kill poultry and larger mammals such as macropod species and sheep (Menkhorst 1995). In many conservation areas, particularly in near-urban locations where fox densities are high, they are thought to pose a serious threat to biodiversity conservation (Menkhorst 1995; Friend et al. 2001; Mahon 2001).