ABSTRACT Changes to fire regimes, including application of prescribed burns, represent a threatening process for species worldwide. A challenge is to determine how the spatial pattern of prescribed burns can be manipulated to minimise impacts on species of concern. We used an experimental approach to assess short‐term responses of a threatened marsupial, the brush‐tailed phascogale Phascogale tapoatafa , to landscape‐scale prescribed burns. We used remote cameras to survey this species in 14 forested landscapes subject to burns that varied in % burn cover. Analysis was undertaken using occupancy modelling at both landscape and plot level (5 plots per landscape). The brush‐tailed phascogale was widespread but scarce, recorded in 13/14 landscapes and 25/70 plots. While occupancy was not influenced by fire or habitat covariates, detectability decreased with time since camera deployment, and with increasing burn cover. Thus, although persisting, its activity and presumed population density declined as more of the landscape was burned. A negative relationship between burn cover and burn patchiness in these landscapes suggests a patchy mosaic, rather than complete burn, will moderate detrimental effects. A patchy mosaic can contribute to reducing fuel loads while limiting loss of critical structural features on which many species depend, but which take decades to replace.
Peisley et al. (Sun,) studied this question.