Reid Tingley Heydon-Laurence Building, A08 University of Sydney NSW 2006 Room 440 Ph: (02) 9036 7812 Fax: (02) 9351 5609 e-mail: reid.tingley@gmail.com

Current Research Publications Presentations Awards

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The invasion dynamics of the cane toad (Bufo marinus) in Australia

Climate change, habitat loss, and invasive species are the most ubiquitous threats to global biodiversity. My research addresses the ways in which these factors influence amphibian and reptile endangerment at various spatial and temporal scales. At coarse scales, I use large spatial and biological databases to investigate how natural and anthropogenic mechanisms influence distributions of both native [1] and introduced species [2]. At smaller scales, I use observational and experimental field studies to investigate how human activities affect the survival [3], reproduction [4], and distribution [5] of imperiled species. Once upon a time, I was also an organic chemist [6-12].

In 2009, I joined Team Bufo to study the invasion dynamics of the cane toad (Bufo marinus) at a global scale. Studying the spread of invasive species is not only of interest to wildlife managers attempting to ameliorate biodiversity impacts, but also provides crucial insights into how species will shift their distributions in response to climate change. This is because an invasive species is a species that is shifting its range in response to the availability of adjacent, uncolonised habitat, which is the same reason native species shift their range in response to climate change. Thus, examining the spread of invasive species provides a framework within which to test our ability to predict the eventual geographic range of a species, as well as its rate of range-shift.

 

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Conference Presentations

September 2009	The frog filter: amphibian introduction bias driven by taxonomy, body size, and biogeography. Annual Meeting of the Canadian Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Network, Saskatoon, SK, Canada.
February 2009	Predicting the distribution of a riparian species at risk: the North American wood turtle (Glyptemys insculpta). Second Meeting of the Australasian Societies for Herpetology, Albany, Auckland, New Zealand.
June 2008	Painted turtle soup. Plenary speaker at the Annual Meeting of the Lagoon Society, Pender Harbour, BC, Canada.
May 2008	Land-cover improves bioclimatic models for anurans and turtles at a regional scale. Annual Meeting of the Canadian Society of Zoologists, Halifax, NS, Canada.
March 2008	Land-cover improves bioclimatic models for anurans and turtles at a regional scale. Northeast Biological Graduate Student Conference, Biddeford, ME, USA.
September 2007	Does climate limit anuran distributions in Nova Scotia? Annual Meeting of the Canadian Amphibian and Reptile Conservation Network, Kingston, ON, Canada.
February 2007	Does climate limit the distributions of amphibians and reptiles in Nova Scotia? Northeast Biological Graduate Student Conference, Halifax, NS, Canada.
October 2006	Identifying critical habitats for species at risk: statistical and methodological issues. Atlantic Canadian Species at Risk Conference, Lunenburg, NS, Canada.
October 2006	Sustainable management in the Acadian forest: a wood turtle’s perspective. Nova Forest Alliance Forum, Pictou, NS, Canada.
February 2006	Wood turtle habitat selection: a matter of scale. Northeast Biological Graduate Student Conference, Bar Harbor, ME, USA.
March 2005	Species richness, incidence and turnover in Nova Scotia amphibians. Atlantic Universities Undergraduate Biology Colloquium, Antigonish, NS, Canada.
March 2005	The structure and dynamics of amphibian communities in central Nova Scotia. Environmental Studies Symposium, Saint John, NB, Canada.

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Academic Scholarships and Awards

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