PhD Studentship: Developing Behavioural indicators for Conservation Management in Killer Whales, NERC GW4+ DTP PhD studentship for September 2025 Entry Ref 5396

About the Partnership

This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC Great Western Four+ Doctoral Training Partnership (GW4+ DTP). The GW4+ DTP consists of the Great Western Four alliance of the University of Bath, University of Bristol, Cardiff University and the University of Exeter plus five Research Organisation partners: British Antarctic Survey, British Geological Survey, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, the Natural History Museum and Plymouth Marine Laboratory. The partnership aims to provide a broad training in earth and environmental sciences, designed to train tomorrow’s leaders in earth and environmental science. For further details about the programme please see http://nercgw4plus.ac.uk/

Project details

For information relating to the research project please contact the lead Supervisor via d.p.croft@exeter.ac.uk

Project Aims and Methods

Assessing the viability of long-lived wild animal populations presents a significant conservation challenge, often requiring decades of monitoring demographic turnover (births and deaths) to detect critical demographic changes. In humans, behaviour changes are well established as early indicators of changes in health, but the potential of behavioural changes to predict demographic shifts in wild animal populations remains largely unexplored. This PhD project will focus on the critically endangered Southern Resident killer whales in the Pacific Northeast Ocean. Working in close collaboration with the Center for Whale Research (USA), the student will co-develop a project using nearly 50 years of behavioural and demographic data and a decade of high-resolution drone video footage to identify leading behavioural indicators of survival and reproduction. Candidate behaviours to be analysed include changes in space use, activity budgets, social interactions, and behavioural synchronisation. This interdisciplinary research will provide training in marine ecology, animal behaviour, conservation biology, and advanced statistical methods. Additionally, the student will work closely with a conservation charity, gaining valuable experience in public education and policy outreach. The outputs of this project will provide a new framework for forecasting population demography using behavioural data, offering a novel approach to conservation in long-lived social mammals. 

Training

The DTP offers funding to undertake specialist training relating to the student’s specialist area of research.

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