If you wish to contact me with questions or wish purchase any of my photos, please email me: tobiashayashi@hotmail.com
Welcome to my world!
This website is the result of countless hours spent doing what I love - being in nature. Since the first few camping trips as a young kid, I was hooked - being in the bush, exploring, documenting. It has been a persistent force throughout school, university and beyond, pulling me out of home, getting me motivated and ... out there. What started out as a childhood interest in birds has turned into research on orchid pollination and a general interest in all things nature.
Since getting my first DSLR back in 2008, I have sought more and more to document the amazing variety of natural life that occurs here in Australia. This country is home to a unique set of fauna and flora, some well documented, others completely unknown.
Similarly, my motivation for research on orchid pollination is to add just that little bit more to our understanding of the natural world. What is it that we have inherited? What do we stand to lose if we don’t conserve nature adequately? How can we conserve our biodiversity?
Work:
I am currently working in the Australian Government Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water in threatened species conservation and listing.
I completed my PhD at The Australian National University (ANU) in 2022, supervised by Prof. Rod Peakall. My research focused on the pollination of greenhood (Pterostylis) orchids in southern Australia, in particular how widespread the unusual sexual deception pollination strategy is. I am also interested in the chemical ecology of pollinator attraction, as many of these orchids use unusual compounds to sexually deceive pollinators. I completed my Honours (First Class) in 2016 also at ANU with Prof. Rod Peakall. My research focused on finding the pollinator of the Critically Endangered Canberra spider orchid (Caladenia actensis).
I have also worked or volunteered in various field ecology roles. For several years I worked as a research assistant in plant ecology at the Research School of Biology at ANU. I have been a consulting field botanist with the ACT Government and have worked as a field zoologist for Biosis. I have also volunteered helping researchers tracking frill-necked lizards in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, and helping capture dragons in South Australia.
