Grampians Biodiversity Census
A Biodiversity census conducted in The Grampians has uncovered some rare and endangered Australian creepy crawlies. Photo: Museum Victoria
IT resembles an unfriendly creature from the movie Alien, with its collection of spiky legs and front claws to tear prey apart. It lives just a few hours away from Melbourne, but rest assured we humans are safe from its grasp, for a fully grown specimen is only about as long as a man's finger.
The creature, a ''giant isopod'', is just one of many dramatic-looking creatures observed and recorded in a comprehensive biodiversity census of the Grampians National Park in recent days.
The giant isopod is not the most prickly creature to call the park home. The mountain dragon lizard, a small reptile with a spiky back, head, neck and even tummy, must surely be a key rival for that title.
The discovery of the lizard in the 167,000-hectare park is one of the most exciting finds so far in the 12-day investigation. Four have been found, yet before the Grampians bioscan, the lizard was only known in the form of two museum specimens.
The research team is made up of 60 Museum Victoria researchers and 20 Parks Victoria rangers. They have walked, waded, dived in waterways and climbed their way across the park to record its fauna and flora.
They have found red-bellied black snakes, ''seriously large'' tiger snakes and scary-looking spiders, but they have also found plenty of small, cute, soft - and rare - mammals.
The discovery of healthy populations of two endangered native mice, the smoky mouse and the heath mouse, are two of the highlights. Mark Norman, head of science at Museum Victoria, said the smoky mouse was a key priority for the bioscan.
''We didn't expect to be able to find a smoky mouse very easily. It's critically endangered in the state and we got four on the first set of trap lines in one of the valleys there. So to get four shows there's healthy populations,'' he said.
Dr Norman said the Grampians acted as an ''ark'' for wildlife among the plains of western Victoria. ''These big iconic parks end up being really critical refuges for lots of endangered and threatened species. So we've put a particular focus on looking for endangered and threatened species to see what nick they're in. And we've found really healthy populations of a really wide range of species that elsewhere around the state are doing quite poorly - so that's been a great relief,'' he said.
While Dr Norman was pleased to see healthy numbers of reptiles, small marsupials and aquatic life in the park, he was no less impressed by the giant isopod, an invertebrate found on the forest floor.
''With our macro photography you get a sense of how dramatic these critters are, you wouldn't want to meet one that's at your size scale. It would tear your head off fairly easily,'' he said.
Parks Victoria ranger Ryan Duffy said the sighting of many small native mammals, such as sugar gliders, swamp rats and eastern pygmy possums was heartening. ''Good numbers of these small mammals … are an excellent sign that the fox-baiting program we've been running is paying off,'' he said.