Field assistant in Tasmania (Australia)

 – Organization: Australian National University. Location: Southeastern Tasmania, Australia. Duration: 4 months (Sept 2013-Dec 2013). Job Type: Temporary. Number of Openings: 1-2. Application Deadline: 1 July 2013. Job Description: Field assistant needed to study the survival, breeding, and behavior of forty-spotted pardalotes in southeastern Tasmania (Bruny Island, Tinderbox Peninsula, Maria Island). Primary duties include nest searching and monitoring, mist-netting and banding, resighting color-banded birds, installing camera traps, and behavioral observations. Forty-spotted pardalotes are cavity-nesters and we access their nests (and nest boxes) using ladders and climbing ropes. Field assistant will conduct data entry, work independently, and communicate regularly with supervisor. Stipend: $1,000/month, plus food and housing in Tasmania. The work schedule is variable, but typically six days on, one day off. Qualifications: Applicants must be in excellent physical health with outstanding hearing and vision, be able to tolerate isolation, weather extremes, long field days, and frequent encounters with highly poisonous snakes and large spiders. Mist-netting and banding experience is required. Climbing experience is desirable, but willingness to learn is great too. Applicants must be highly independent, self-motivated and comfortable living with 1-2 other people either in a small cabin/cottage, apartment, or tents. Willingness to camp and to cycle up to 13 km to field sites in all weather conditions, and to be persistent through all kinds of difficulties is crucial. We also prefer candidates with an excellent academic record and a strong interest in research. Applicants must pay their own way to Hobart, Tasmania. To Apply: Send CV, cover letter, and contact information for two references to AMANDA EDWORTHY (EM: amanda.edworthy AT anu.edu.au); please include “forty-spot field assistant” as subject.