The first trial of a 'virtual fence' by a council in New South Wales has been a major success in reducing road accidents with wildlife.
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One kilometre of 'virtual fencing' was installed along Cullendulla Drive north of Batemans Bay in October last year - a section of road notorious for its high number of wildlife fatalities and injuries.
The road was selected after being identified through roadkill records as one of the area's most significant hotspots.
Over the 12 months, Council and WIRES volunteer callouts dropped from up to five kangaroo and wallaby deaths per week during the peak holiday period, to just five animal deaths in total over eight months.
The project was spearheaded by local community group, The Coastwatchers Association, in partnership with Eurobodalla Shire Council and WIRES volunteers, with funding support from Great Eastern Ranges (GER) and the World Wide Fund for Nature-Australia (WWF-Australia).
The system, supplied by Wildlife Safety Solutions, consists of a series of poles set at 25-metre intervals along the road in a zigzag pattern. When a vehicle approaches, the headlights activate a sensor at the top of each pole which triggers it to make a sound and flash blue and yellow flashing lights creating a 'virtual fence' that alerts animals.
Natural Resource Supervisor at Eurobodalla Council Courtney Fink-Downes said the trial had been a resounding success - especially because the pilot period included both Christmas and Easter, which are two of the region's busiest peaks in terms of visitation and road use.
WIRES volunteer Janelle Renes said it was a remarkable shift.
"It's absolutely amazing," she said. "It's a lot less traumatic for the rescuers, carers and council staff and saves the insurance companies a lot of money from reduced claims. We'd like to see them everywhere."
Council costs to remove killed animals has also been drastically reduced.
Due to the success of the fence, a second section will be installed along Dunn's Creek Road, another South Coast roadkill hotspot.
"We are thrilled by the success of the fence at Long Beach and predict that the second one will have a similar positive impact," CEO of Great Eastern Ranges Gary Howling said.
"Vehicle strike takes an extremely high toll on our native wildlife, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 10 million animals every year as they traverse roads in search of food, shelter and mates.
"We are behind the rest of the world in terms of putting in place wildlife crossing structures and measures that reduce the impact of our roads on animals and improve road safety for drivers."
"The virtual fences on the South Coast are doing just that," says Gary.
He said a sad reality was that Australia was a leader in extinction and biodiversity loss rates.
"So we need to pull every lever at our disposal to turn this crisis around. We hope innovative solutions like this virtual fencing ca complement longer-term efforts to reconnect fragmented habitat and buy some time for our threatened wildlife," adds WWF's regenerative country head Darren Grover.
The virtual fence on Dunn's Creek Road will be installed by council workers later this year. The success of the fences at both spots will continue to be monitored by comparing the roadkill dat collected by council prior to installation with that gathered after.
