Growing up in the urban jungle of Hong Kong, the vast open plains of the Masai Mara and its millions of migrating wildebeest felt distant and almost unimaginable yet deeply enchanting. That sense of wonder became reality when I took my first steps in Africa on a Kenya-Tanzania field trip during my undergraduate studies in ecology. The moment I came eye to eye with my first cheetah remains vivid and unforgettable.

This early fascination with Africa eventually grew into seven years of PhD and postdoctoral research in South Africa, where I studied lion behaviour and their spatial and behavioural interactions with large herbivorous prey under the Landscape of Fear framework. My work combined GPS tracking and statistical modelling to examine animal movement, space use, and habitat selection, exploring how introduced lions adapt to new environments and how carnivore reintroductions reshape predation risk and prey behaviour across landscapes.

I first visited New Zealand during my PhD to attend a conference and spent a month travelling around the country. The island’s remarkable uniqueness and endemism left a lasting impression, and after completing my research journey in South Africa, I decided to relocate to New Zealand to learn more about its ecosystems and to settle permanently.

During the COVID period, I undertook an MSc in biosecurity and conservation to retrain and upskill in New Zealand’s ecological systems. Following this, I began a second postdoctoral position at Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research (MWLR) and subsequently transitioned into my current role as a wildlife ecologist in the Wildlife Ecology and Management team. I also currently serve as Vice President of the Australasian Wildlife Management Society (AWMS). 

My research in New Zealand spans a broad range of topics, with a primary focus on monitoring invasive mammalian predators and applying behavioural ecology to inform management. For example, I develop non-lethal management tools for urban cat management and estimate feral cat densities to better understand environmental drivers of population dynamics and detection probability.