Data from: Koalas, friends, and foes – the application of airborne eDNA for the biomonitoring of threatened species

Perched high up in a Eucalyptus tree, swaying from side to side,
lies a sleepy koala unaware of the means spent each year trying to obtain
accurate baseline information about its presence. We have thrown all we
could at it, from wildlife surveys to night spotting, bioacoustics,
detection dogs, and drones equipped with thermal cameras. Yet, whilst
critical to its conservation and management efforts, finding a koala
remains an ambitious, time-consuming, and costly endeavour often producing
insufficient results. Little did we know that traces of koalas’ presence
and that of its predators along with other native, domesticated, and
invasive species, float in the air and can be detected through traces of
DNA. This study confirms that koalas alongside species belonging to the
wallaby, possum family, invasive species such as foxes, domestic dogs and
rabbits can successfully be detected by sampling airborne particles. We
detected 16 unique taxonomic assignments through sampling of airborne
particles, successfully assigning 11 of these to species level. Further,
we develop and employ a novel koala-specific qPCR for the cost-effective
detection of koala eDNA in the wild. Together, this study demonstrates the
potential of airborne eDNA for the detection of threatened terrestrial
wildlife under natural conditions and presents achievable optimisation
steps to increase its field applicability and validity.