Untangling Barbed Wire with ecologist Jasmine Vink

The Australasian Bat Society welcomes ecologist Jasmine Vink for webinar 6: "Untangling Barbed Wire: Preventing bat entanglement through legislation, citizen science and effective mitigation"

Jasmine is an ecologist and bat rehabilitator based in Far North Queensland. Professionally, she specialises in bats, using legislation to assess impacts and design effective mitigation strategies. Voluntarily, she rehabilitates bats, with a particular focus on flying foxes. Jasmine has a special interest in the impacts of barbed wire on bats, using data to target effective mitigation.

The aim of this talk is to educate and empower people to take action in their own regions and areas of expertise to reduce the number of bats becoming entangled on barbed wire. The talk is relevant to ecologists, councils, wildlife rehabilitators, regulators and anyone interested in bat conservation. We will explore how ecologists and regulators can prevent barbed wire installation, how to effectively mitigate existing barbed wire, and how citizen science can be used to identify problem areas and guide action. The talk will also examine a successful urban mitigation project, alongside the challenges and lessons emerging from an ongoing rural project.