Short Range Endemics

Bennelongia has extensive experience undertaking field and desktop surveys of Short Range Endemics (SREs) for resource development. SREs are sampled by visual searching, trapping and sorting through soil and litter according to EPAs’ Technical Guidance – Sampling short range endemic fauna here. Bennelongia provides specialists identifications and holds an extensive voucher collections and collaborates with the Western Australian Museum. Example projects can be found here.

Why survey Short Range Endemics

Short Range Endemics (SREs) are species with highly restricted geographic distributions, generally defined as a range <10,000 km². In Western Australia’s environmental assessment process, the term refers to species with tight habitat requirements that occur in only a small fraction of their overall range.

There is a second and more restricted use of the term SREs in the environmental assessment process in Western Australia, whereby it is applied to specific groups of terrestrial invertebrates. The persistence of SRE species, like subterranean fauna, may sometimes be threatened by large-scale ground disturbance and, therefore, as part of the State’s environmental assessment process the proponents of development proposals must demonstrate that SRE species are not at risk of extinction.