Main research projects

The bioDEERversity project is looking at the effects of deer on biodiversity in the the Wicklow/Dublin mountains where sika deer have reached the highest relative density in Ireland. This project is looking at the effects of deer on soil ecology (both biotic and abiotic components, including invertebrates, fungi and bacteria), plant communities and diversity, mammal diversity (via camera traps), and bird diversity (via sound recorders) by comparing areas with varying density of sika deer. 

Project team: Simone Ciuti, Virginia Morera-Pujol, Tancredi Caruso, Adam Smith, Colin Brock and Kilian Murphy. 

This project is involving many deer stakeholders (hunters, farmers, foresters, landowners, government agencies, citizens) who are key to the success of any initiatives of this kind. Colin Brock is the key player in this project and results will be released soon.

We are running a number of projects to understand bovine TB dynamics in wildlife and how land use change and wildlife management may affect the maintenance of the disease in the wild, and whether and how this is linked to outbreaks in farms and their cattle. 

Virginia Morera-Pujol is building multi-hierarchical Bayesian models to predict badger distribution and density across Ireland, and aims at understanding how badger body condition and localized abundance may be linked to greater likelihood of bTB occurrence and spread. 

Kilian Murphy is currently building Agent Based Models to simulate badger movement and predict contact rates with cattle under different climate change, land use change, and wildlife management scenarios.   

We strive to extend our knowledge of wildlife hosts and study their role in Tb breakdowns at the landscape level by considering relevant climate factors and land-use characteristics and change. We wish to collaborate with current work being undertaken at the herd level of Tb transmission and complete a comprehensive risk analysis for Tb breakdown factors from individual animals to landscape ecology in a multi-host system. One question remains unanswered: what is the role of deer (if any) on bTB dynamics in Ireland? We are working to tackle this very important gap in knowledge.

The research projects we are running in the Phoenix Park are cutting edge, original, and are meant to change the way we monitor, observe, manage and conserve wildlife. Lessons learnt have the potential to stir wildlife monitoring and management in completely different ecological contexts across the globe. For instance, we are developing novel approaches to estimate body size, weight, horn, and antler size in large herbivores using non-invasive remote photogrammetry, i.e. the extraction of real-world measurements from photographic data.  Students involved in the fallow deer research are testing recent advances with technology, dealing with new wildlife-human conflicts arising in urban areas, and measuring behaviour in deer at a resolution never attempted before.  Here we are training the next generation of wildlife biologists and managers. We have set up the scene for a fascinating longitudinal study on fallow deer, with more than 85% of deer of the population individually identifiable by unique colour-coded ear tags. We have several research projects, including projects such as linking animal personality to life history, distance sampling in peri-urban areas, and more. We are carrying out the first empirical study aimed at understanding the effects of tourists feeding the deer on their ecology and behaviour. We have been testing the efficacy of a number of management actions aimed at minimizing the issue, generating a new approach on how to deal with human-wildlife feeding interactions.