Arthur Rylah Institute senior scientist Dr Jenny Nelson says it is impossible to calculate how many tiger quolls are in Victoria because they are not distributed evenly within habitats. She agrees tiger quolls are likely to be functionally extinct in the Otways and says the only Victorian site researchers reliably find the species is near the Snowy River.

Since 2006 - including this winter - Parks Victoria and the Department of Sustainability and Environment have used camera traps to sight quolls in the Otways, but with no luck. Worrying Dr Nelson further is the ''unbelievable'' number of feral cats in the Otways. In 2007 cameras were set up over 6000 hectares at 51 sites. At 42 sites, cats were found.

''If the quolls are breeding, the juveniles are only about 400 grams and would be easy prey for cats,'' she says. After years of frustration the Cape Otway Centre for Conservation Ecology is now deploying a new tactic to try to find the lost quoll. Badger, a three-year-old Australia shepherd, is being trained to find them by following the smell of their scat.

The Cape Otway centre was opened in 2004 by Lizzie Corke and Shayne Neal. In April this year they sourced three tiger quolls from NSW captive breeding programs, which they house in a sanctuary dubbed the ''Quolliseum''.

The scat from the three captive quolls is used by the centre's conservation manager, Dr Kellie Leigh, and trainer Martin Dominick to teach Badger. Badger can now detect quoll poo under piles of leaves from 100 metres away.