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Alan Kwok

Tel: +61 2 9385 8276
Fax: +61 2 9385 2202
Email: a.kwokstudent.unsw.edu.au

PhD Candidate in Ecology University of New South Wales (2008- present)
BSc (Hons) in Biological Ecology, University of New South Wales 2006

Shrub-resident arthropods from arid and semi-arid woodlands

My research focus is on arthropods (primarily insects and spiders), the small, ubiquitous “bugs” that we tend to ignore. Specifically, I am interested in those arthropods that inhabit the shrubs that cover much of semi-arid eastern Australia.Shrub encroachment (sometimes called ‘woody weed’ invasion or shrub proliferation) is a global phenomenon, but much of the research in Australia has focused on shrub control. Little is known about the types of arthropods using these shrubs and the functions they perform. I am also interested in the spider fauna of semi-arid Australia and how these vary in relation to different spatial and patterns of vegetation. The types of questions that I am interested in include:

• Are current landscape health indices useful as surrogates of arthropod biodiversity?
• Does the arthropod community differ among shrub species, particularly where different shrub species co-exist spatially?
• What factors might explain the distribution of shrub-resident arthropods (e.g. multi-scale shrub density, nearest neighbour identity, season, plant nutrients, etc)?
• What controls the distrubtion of ground-dwelling arthropods in semi-arid woodland communities?

Publications

Leary, T., Kwok, A., Khan, B., Ibbetson, P. (in press) Yuppy bandicoots of inner west Sydney—in hiding or urban renewal? Australian Zoologist.

Eldridge, D.J., Kwok, A.B.C. (2008) Soil disturbance by animals at varying spatial scales in a semi-arid Australian woodland. The Rangeland Journal 30, 327-337.