How & Dell: Reptile assemblages of the northeast Pilbara 
Table 4 
Number of pit-trap days at sampling sites burnt in January 1990 (WS 2, 3, 4) and those that remained unbumt throughout the study 
(WS 5, 6, 10). Species and individuals caught during the two years sampling pre-bum [1988, 1989] and year post-bum [1990] are 
presented. 
SPECIES Pitdays 
Burnt sites 
88B 89B 
372 222 
90B 
360 
Unbumt sites 
88U 89U 
312 216 
90U 
396 
Diplodactylus conspicillatus 
2 
3 
8 
2 
3 
6 
Diplodactylus stenodactylus 
3 
2 
5 
2 
3 
0 
Geliyra variegata 
0 
4 
0 
0 
0 
0 
Heleronolia binoei 
2 
1 
0 
0 
0 
1 
Nephrurus levis 
3 
3 
0 
2 
2 
3 
Rhynchoedura ornata 
2 
0 
1 
1 
0 
0 
Strophurus elderi 
0 
1 
1 
1 
0 
1 
Delma pax 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
1 
Lialis burtonis 
0 
4 
0 
0 
0 
0 
Ctenophorus caudicinctus 
0 
1 
0 
0 
0 
0 
Ctenophorus nuchalis 
0 
1 
11 
2 
1 
0 
Ctenophorus isolepis 
3 
1 
0 
5 
8 
5 
Pogona minor 
0 
3 
0 
1 
1 
0 
Cfenotus duricola 
2 
4 
0 
6 
5 
10 
Ctenotus grandis 
10 
8 
0 
3 
2 
4 
Ctenotus helenae 
0 
3 
0 
4 
0 
4 
Ctetiotus pantherinus 
5 
7 
0 
11 
6 
12 
Ctenotus serventyi 
1 
1 
1 
0 
2 
0 
Egertiia striata 
4 
0 
5 
3 
5 
8 
Lerista bipes 
6 
2 
2 
11 
4 
1 
Menetia greyii 
0 
0 
0 
1 
0 
3 
Morethia ruficauda 
2 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
Notoscincus omatus 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
1 
Proablepharus reginae 
0 
0 
0 
0 
0 
2 
Tiliqua multifasciata 
2 
0 
2 
0 
0 
0 
Varanus acanthurus 
0 
1 
0 
0 
0 
0 
Varanus brevicauda 
2 
0 
0 
4 
3 
6 
Varanus eremius 
2 
0 
0 
0 
0 
1 
Varanus gouldii 
0 
1 
1 
0 
0 
0 
No. species 
16 
19 
10 
16 
13 
17 
No. individuals 
51 
51 
37 
59 
45 
69 
lndiv/10 pitdays 
1.37 
2.29 
1.03 
1.89 
2.08 
3.64 
Shannon Diversity [H] 
3.74 
3.90 
2.80 
3.57 
3.47 
3.64 
Log series diversity [a] 
8.00 
10.98 
4.50 
7.22 
6.12 
7.20 
Simpson Evenness [E] 
0.69 
0.64 
0.55 
0.58 
0.75 
0.60 
remained unburnt (WS5, WS6, WS10) throughout are 
presented for each year of sampling in Table 4. 
On the burnt sites both the number of species and 
individuals declined in the nine months post fire and 
these areas had both a lowered species diversity and 
evenness (Table 4). In the sites that remained unbumt, 
species number fluctuated less and both species diversity 
and evenness showed smaller changes. The similarity of 
lizard assemblages on the area burnt (B) in the third year 
and assemblages on the unburnt (U) area over each of 
the three years is presented in Figure 3. The least similar 
assemblage was recorded in the area burnt by the fire of 
January 1990. 
The species least affected by fire, at least in the short 
term, were those that live in burrows or are primarily 
fossorial. In the burnt sample sites, 32 of the 37 
individuals trapped after the fire belonged to the species 
Ctenophorus nuchalis, Diplodactylus conspicillatus, D. 
stenodactylus, Rhynchoedura ornata, Egernia striata (four of 
these are nocturnal and all live in burrows) or Lerista 
bipes (which is fossorial). 
Discussion 
The opportunistic collections of the fauna made over 
the past 50 years from the 1,500 km 2 Abydos/Woodstock 
area has resulted in a substantial body of knowledge on 
mammals (How & Cooper 2002) and birds (Storr 1984; 
How et al. 1991) but the herpetofauna remains the least 
known group of vertebrates. The 24 species of reptile and 
one frog that were recorded on the study area for the 
first time during this survey included the endemic skink, 
Ctenotus nigrilineatus, which was subsequently described 
from two specimens collected from one localised rockpile 
in the study area (Storr 1990). 
The herpetofaunal assemblage of the Abydos/ 
Woodstock area, comprising 5 amphibians and 67 
reptiles, is one of the richest recorded in Australia. In a 
recent review of studies defining the diversity of reptiles 
in arid and mesic habitats of Australia, Thompson et al. 
(2003a) compared the findings of 14 areas that sampled 
reptiles at three broad geographic scales, viz. bioregional, 
landscape and biotope. The number of reptile species 
recorded in the 12 landscape level surveys reported in 
91 
