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ContactWill Rayment image

Office 310 Castle Street, room 211a
Tel +64 3 479 8304
Email will.rayment@otago.ac.nz

Academic qualifications

BA Oxford
MSc University College London
PhD University of Otago

Research interests

  • Ecology and conservation biology of cetaceans
  • Capture-recapture methods and analyses
  • Species-habitat relationships
  • Efficacy of Marine Protected Areas and MPA networks

Will is also a member of the Coastal People: Southern Skies collaboration that connects communities with world-leading, cross-discipline research to rebuild coastal ecosystems.

Coastal People: Southern Skies

He Kitenga: Auckland Islands: Baleen barometers outlines recent work combining aerial photography and computer software to measure the condition of southern right whales.

Teaching

  • ECOL 111 Ecology and Conservation of Diversity
  • MARI 112 Marine Biology: The Living Ocean
  • MARI 302 Biology and Behaviour of Marine Vertebrates (course co-ordinator)
  • MARI 401 Advanced Methods in Marine Science
  • MARI 429 Coastal Marine Environment (course co-ordinator)
  • MARI 431 Antarctic and Southern Ocean Science
  • ZOOL 418 Conservation Biology of Marine Mammals

Postgraduate students

Current students

  • Steph Bennington, PhD: Transferring statistical models between populations and species
  • Namrata Chand, PhD: Ecosystem Functioning and Role of Soft Sediment Macroalgal Communities
  • Leah Crowe, PhD: Variability and vulnerability of the critically endangered Fiordland bottlenose dolphin
  • Nicholas Daudt, PhD: Spatiotemporal patterns and environmental drivers of seabird assemblages in Australasia, a world hotspot of seabird diversity
  • Stella Simpson, MSc: Investigating the effects of oceanic conditions on sperm whales and their prey at Kaikōura
  • Hanna Ravn, MSc:  Pakake / NZ sea lion diet analysis – a participatory science approach
  • Lindsay Wickman, PhD: Population modelling of Hector's dolphins at Banks Peninsula, NZ.

Completed students

  • David Johnston PhD: Sentinels of the Southern Ocean: southern right whales (Eubalaena australis) as indicators of oceanic productivity
  • José Emilio Trujillo Moyano, PhD: Insights into neonate reef sharks' vulnerability to predation: a behavioural, physiological and ecological approach
  • Gaby Keeler-May, PhD: Undaria pinnatifida management and control in Southern New Zealand
  • Moss Thompson, MSc: Pup survival of the New Zealand sea lion on the Otago Coast
  • Hannah Williams, MSc: Abundance and distribution of Hector's dolphins in Otago and effectiveness of current protection measures

Publications

Bennington, S. M., Bourke, S. D., Wilkinson, S. P., Englebert, N., Bond, D. M., Jeunen, G.-J., Dawson, S., Slooten, E., Dillingham, P. W., Rayment, W. J., & Alexander, A. (2024). New insights into the population structure of Hector's dolphin (Cephalorhynchus hectori) revealed using environmental DNA. Environmental DNA, 6, e70024. doi: 10.1002/edn3.70024 Journal - Research Article

Bennington, S., Dillingham, P. W., Bourke, S. D., Dawson, S. M., Slooten, E., & Rayment, W. J. (2024). Testing spatial transferability of species distribution models reveals differing habitat preferences for an endangered delphinid (Cephalorhynchus hectori) in Aotearoa, New Zealand. Ecology & Evolution, 14, e70074. doi: 10.1002/ece3.70074 Journal - Research Article

Valdés Hernández, M. J., Dawson, S., Pavanato, H., Leunissen, E., & Rayment, W. (2024). Using passive acoustic monitoring to assess the overlap between endemic endangered Hector's dolphin (Cephalorhynchus hectori hectori) and mussel farms in the Banks Peninsula Marine Mammal Sanctuary, New Zealand. Aquatic Conservation, 34, e4207. doi: 10.1002/aqc.4207 Journal - Research Article

Czechowski, P., de Lange, M., Heldsinger, M., Kardailsky, A., Rayment, W., Hepburn, C., … Knapp, M. (2024). Comparison of traditional and molecular surveys of fish biodiversity in southern Te Wāhipounamu/Fiordland (Aotearoa/New Zealand). Environmental DNA, 6(e514). doi: 10.1002/edn3.514 Journal - Research Article

Daudt, N. W., Woehler, E. J., Schofield, M. R., Smith, R. O., Bugoni, L., & Rayment, W. J. (2024). Seabird assemblages are linked to the major western boundary current off eastern Australia. Progress in Oceanography, 223, 103215. doi: 10.1016/j.pocean.2024.103215 Journal - Research Article

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