Post-conference trips, tours and workshops
Post-conference Field Trip – 9th July 2026 to Mulligans Flat
The short post-conference field trip will take place on Thursday evening at the end of the conference to Mulligans Flat Woodland Sanctuary, 15 km north of the centre of Canberra https://www.mulligansflat.org.au/.
The evening will include spotlighting and exploring the rich diversity of this Box-gum Grassy-woodland area managed for conservation, which is free from the impacts of foxes, rabbits, goats, deer and hares. Participants will need to book directly with Mulligans Flat and self-arrange return transport to their accommodation in Canberra.
More details will be provided later, including costs and booking details.
Optional Friday tours and workshops
Tour of the Australian National Wildlife Collection - Friday 10th July 2026
This is an exclusive opportunity to tour the new state-of-the-art building that houses the Australian National Wildlife Collection and the Australian National Insect Collection, both part of the CSIRO National Research Collections Australia (NRCA). Named 'Diversity', the $90 million NRCA building in Canberra features temperature-controlled vaults that are bushfire and pest-resistant, and designed to preserve over 13 million specimens for future generations. (Link: https://www.csiro.au/en/about/facilities-collections/collections/collections-precinct).
Diversity was designed to realise the full research potential of the collections by co-locating the specimens with cutting-edge digital, curatorial and molecular facilities. The high-throughput digitisation and imaging suite makes specimens more accessible to the international research community, enabling morphological and taxonomic research. The extensive molecular laboratories can process the complete range of biological material held within collections. The most sensitive, ancient and degraded specimens are processed in a specialised and self-contained Trace Laboratory; whereas the modern DNA labs process high-quality material derived from vouchered specimens to generate genomic resources for Australia’s unique biodiversity https://research.csiro.au/dnalibrary/).
Most relevant to the Australian Mammal Society and the Australasian Bat Society, the Australian National Wildlife Collection holds mammals, birds and reptiles from Australia and Papua New Guinea. The collection includes rare and unique specimens, such as histological slides of thylacine brains. The collection is available for use by the national and international research community but is not open to the general public (https://www.csiro.au/en/about/facilities-collections/collections/anwc).
This tour will take 1-2 hours. There are limited places due to visitor capacity in the vaults and integrated pest management procedures, with a maximum of 12 people per tour with the potential for two tours. This is a free event but register on the registration form if you would like to attend. If more people apply than there is space for, a ballot system may be needed. The CSIRO Black Mountain site is 1.5 km from the Shine Dome.
Animal Monitoring Workshop - Friday 10th July 2026
This 2-hour workshop will be held at the Australian National University campus behind the Shine Dome.
Learn about the diverse and emergent technologies used to monitor animals spanning camera trapping and AI, GPS tracking, microchips, and acoustic recorders. In this workshop you'll have the opportunity to learn new techniques, chat through methodological do's and don'ts, hear from real-world applications, explore new approaches, and network with others. No experience necessary, just a curious mind!
This is a free event, but please indicate in your registration form if you plan to attend to assist with logistics and to receive more information.
Atlas of Living Australia Workshop - Friday 10th July 2026
This 2-hour workshop will be held at the Australian National University campus behind the Shine Dome. Discussions will include using the data from the ALA and submitting data to the ALA.
This is a free event, but please indicate in your registration form if you plan to attend to assist with logistics and to receive more information.
Weekend post-conference field trips
Two weekend field trips are currently being planned.
1. Overnight trip to Eden, visiting key wildlife sites enroute, Saturday 11th – Sunday 12th July
On Friday evening before the trip starts there could be an optional visit to a smoky mouse captive breeding facility. The main trip would leave Canberra on Saturday morning 11th July and travel to Bondi State Forest which is the site of rediscovery of the long-footed potoroo in NSW in 2023. The Nungatta Feral Predator Free Area abutting Bondi SF would then be visited which is a reintroduction site for smoky mice and potentially long-footed potoroos. Following this would be a tour of the Eden hinterland State Forests with a focus on potoroos, southern brown bandicoot and fire impacts. After dinner and settling into accommodation in Eden, the evening will be spent spotlighting and undertaking thermal observations of arboreal and ground mammals in Beowa National Park and adjoining State Forest, with the target species yellow-bellied gliders, eastern pygmy possums and long-nosed potoroos. On Sunday morning participants could go on a whale watching tour or visit the killer whale museum. Participants would then return to Canberra during the afternoon.
Details of this trip are currently being finalised. Further information will be provided later on costs, capacity limits and how to register.
2. Day visit to London Bridge and Tidbinbilla, Saturday 11th July
This day trip would visit London Bridge, Queanbeyan to observe platypus and rakali, and then Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve which hosts earless dragons, eastern bettongs, northern corroboree frogs, brushtail rock wallabies and southern brown bandicoots, as well as koalas. An optional pre-tour visit to a smoky mouse captive breeding facility is also planned.
Details of this trip are currently being finalised. Further information will be provided later on costs, capacity limits and how to register.