Latest news with #AustralianWildlifeConservancy
ABC News
a day ago
- General
- ABC News
Woylies release beyond predator fence marks bold jump for species in outback WA
Conservationists say the release of more than 100 woylies beyond the safety of a predator fence is a big, if bold, step towards repopulating the endangered species in Western Australia's remote Wheatbelt. The animals were released "beyond the fence" at Mt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary, 350 kilometres north of Perth, last week, following several decades of work to restore the population in the protected area. Once found across mainland Australia, the population of woylies — or brush-tailed bettongs — fell by almost 90 per cent due to land clearing and invasive species brought about by European settlement. In the Wheatbelt, the local population was believed to be extinct for more than 100 years. Over four nights, 147 woylies were carefully released into bushland outside Mt Gibson's fences, one of the largest and fastest translocation events by the Australian Wildlife Conservancy. Sixteen ecologists worked with local Badimia Rangers to relocate the animals. Wildlife ecologist Louis O'Neill said the newly released woylies faced some risks outside the safe area, but it was important that conservation efforts shook off a "safe haven" mindset. "We admit that we may lose a few individuals, but that's part of the process," he said. "Having the cat presence is important for the woylies to have some predator awareness because we can't get rid of cats across all of Australia. "The woylies can learn to develop anti-predator behaviours." The population at Mt Gibson has grown to more than 1,000 animals from the 162 introduced in 2016. Dr O'Neill said moving the population outside the fence would help the woylies resume their natural role in the broader ecosystem. "They can help with the soil turnover, nutrient recycling, seed germination," he said. Despite the dangers, conservationists are confident the animals will survive and breed. Working in their favour is recent baiting and cage trapping on 60,000 hectares of nearby bushland, with recent surveys confirming a low population of feral cats. "There's a low enough threshold that the woylies can coexist with [cats]" Dr O'Neill said. A number of woylies have also climbed the sanctuary's 2-metre fence in recent years, kick-starting the repopulation by themselves. "The young are growing up and surviving on the outside." Forty of the woylies were fitted with radio collars so that ecologists could track their movements outside the fence.
West Australian
27-06-2025
- General
- West Australian
WA Wildlife Sanctuaries
They may be blissfully unaware of it but many of Australia's endangered native animals owe their existence and continued welfare to the Australian Wildlife Conservancy. Martin Copley, a British-born conservationist and philanthropist who moved to Perth after making his fortune in insurance in the UK, founded the organisation in 1991 when he purchased the Karakamia Wildlife Sanctuary here in WA with aim of saving Australia's native native species. Karakamia covers 268ha in the Jarrah Forest Bioregion near Chidlow about an hour's drive north-east of Perth. When it was first acquired, it had a limited range of native mammals — but after the establishing a feral-proof fence in 1994 and eradicating predators inside — species such as woylie, quenda, tammar wallaby and brushtail possum were reintroduced and have flourished. The AWC's mission is to conserve all Australian wildlife and habitats. It's a nonprofit organisation which relies on philanthropists to acquire large tracts of land. It formed conservation partnerships with First Nations people, private landholders, and governments and has restored more than 50 populations of 20 threatened and locally extinct mammals to 10 sites around the country. AWC's also works hard to control introduced weeds and large feral herbivores such as camels, buffalo, horses and pigs — and it leads one of the largest ecological fire programs in the country. Karakamia was the first but AWC have five other wildlife sanctuaries in WA. + Charnley River-Artesian Range Wildlife Sanctuary in the Kimberley. + Mornington-Marion Downs Wildlife Sanctuary in the Kimberley + Faure Island Wildlife Sanctuary in the Shark Bay World Heritage area. + Mtt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary, about 350 km northeast of Perth. + Paruna Wildlife Sanctuary which forms an important wildlife corridor along the Avon River east of Perth. Conservation is AWC's primary objective but they do welcome visitors to some of their sanctuaries. Access changes from time to time so you will need to check to find out if you can visit. At the time of writing this, the only two sanctuaries you can visit are Paruna Wildlife Sanctuary and Mt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary. The Paruna Wildlife Sanctuary in the Avon Valley has several nice walking trails. Possum Loop is the shortest of the trails (2.3km). It features woodlands, wildflowers, creeks and waterfalls, making it ideal for families, older walkers and those seeking a easy walk. Quenda Circuit is a 6.5km walk of medium difficulty. It is the most popular trail at Paruna and it offers spectacular views of the Paruna Gorge, natural vegetation and even a historic monument. It is ideal for families, scout and school groups and nature enthusiasts. Numbat walking track is a 12km walk of medium to hard difficulty, taking about six to nine hours to complete. It combines sections of the Quenda and Possum trails, and offers creek lines, granite outcrops, wildflowers, and powderbark and wandoo forest. Paruna is open during daytime hours from May 1 to October 31. Visitor numbers are capped to protect the health of the sanctuary and minimise disturbance to wildlife. There's no overnight camping but there are picnic tables and toilets. Access to the sanctuary cost $11 per person and you will need a unique access code to enter, which will be emailed when you have completed your booking. Mt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary about 350km northeast of Perth spans an impressive 131,812ha and supports an extraordinary diversity of flora and fauna. Its varied landscapes includes rugged ranges and sandplains. Mt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary plays a critical role in safeguarding nearly 10 per cent of Australia's nationally threatened mammals. It is the site of Australia's most ambitious mammal restoration project , with 10 species reintroduced to its 7838ha feral predator-free area. the largest cat and fox-free area in mainland Western Australia. The sanctuary also protects 60 acacia species, including the rare and threatened Gibson and Ninghan wattles, which were established in an herbivore-free area in partnership with the WA Department of Parks and Wildlife. Visitors can enjoy self-guided drivers and walks via carefully marked drives and walking trails. Mt Gibson Quartz Ridge campground is open for bookings between May 1 and 30 September and offers unpowered caravan/campervan and tent sites. Facilities include a compost toilet, a simple camp kitchen with barbecues, and a central fire pit with supplied wood. Visitors must bring their own water, fuel, and must manage their waste. The road to access the campsite is only suitable for 4WD vehicles and visitor numbers are capped at a maximum of and eight vehicles and 25 people at any one time. It costs $20 per adult and $10 per night for children and all proceeds support AWC's conservation work. The Mornington Wilderness Camp at Mornington-Marion Downs Wildlife Sanctuary remains closed after it was impacted by the record high floods in 2023 and a spokesperson says there is no estimated reopening date for the camp at the moment. As mentioned earlier AWC is a nonprofit organisation and if you want to donate to this worthy cause visit The Australian Wildlife Conservancy is using AI technology to perfect its SmartGate which is designed to keep their fenced off areas predator free. The AWC manages a network of nine of these safe havens that play a critical role in protecting threatened wildlife from predation by introduced cats and foxes, who are the primary drivers of native mammal extinctions and ongoing declines in Australia. A prototype of the SmartGate has been trialled at AWC's Karakamia Wildlife Sanctuary since September 2024. A spokesperson explains: 'This is a double-gated enclosed tunnel that allows native species to move from one side of a feral predator-free fenced area to the other. 'The gate was deployed in a fenced pen within Karakamia's 286ha feral predator-free fenced area, with woylies as the target species.'
Miami Herald
30-05-2025
- General
- Miami Herald
‘Pint-sized' predator declared locally extinct in Australia. It's making comeback
Just before sundown in the Scotia Wildlife Sanctuary of Australia, smoke filled the sky. Representatives of the Barkindji people were conducting a smoking ceremony to prepare the sanctuary for the milestone return of a fearsome predator — 93 'pint-sized' phascogales. Red-tailed phascogales, known locally as bulku in the Barkindji language, are tiny carnivorous marsupials that have been considered locally extinct in New South Wales since 2016, according to a May 29 news release from the Australian Wildlife Conservancy. Driven to extinction in the region by the introduction of invasive species like cats and foxes, the phascogales have been kept alive through captive breeding programs, according to the conservancy. The last phascogale seen in the Scotia Wildlife Sanctuary was recorded in 1866, the organization said, but that just changed. A total of 56 females and 37 males have now been reintroduced into the wild from a breeding program at the Adelaide Zoo, following health checks, the conservancy said. The bulku were packed into cars and driven seven hours from the zoo to the sanctuary, where they were met by local representatives, according to the release. 'According to AWC ecologists and Adelaide zookeepers, most of the phascogales slept soundly throughout the journey,' the conservancy said. Once the animals arrived, they 'were awoken shortly after sundown, and one-by-one they were released into AWC's Scotia Wildlife Sanctuary's (19,768-acre) feral predator-free fenced area — one of the largest feral-free areas on mainland Australia.' About a third of the animals, 26, were collared with tracking transmitters before their release, allowing wildlife officials to track their movements and how well they survive in the first six to eight weeks in the wild. 'Arriving in May, means the Red-tailed phascogales will be settled and ready to start mating during the July breeding season,' AWC ecologist Rachel Ladd said in the release. 'We're expecting to see some juveniles running around in the second half of the year, unfortunately though, as a Dasyuridae species, this also means all of the males will drop off from the stress of breeding activities.' In a unique breeding strategy, males of the species die immediately after the breeding cycle, the conservancy said. Research suggests the die-off, called semelparity, is caused by a combination of stressors from the physiological changes during mating season that leads to gastrointestinal ulcers, immune suppression, infections and death, according to Bush Heritage Australia. If all goes to plan, wildlife officials said there could be as many as 1,400 phascogales living in the wild of the sanctuary in the next decade, according to the release. Bulku are nocturnal and typically live in trees, but can move along the ground during the day when looking for something to eat, according to Bush Heritage Australia. They eat insects, spiders and even small birds. They are incredibly small, measuring about 4 inches long and weighing about the same as a chicken egg, according to Bush Heritage Australia. They are also capable of jumping significant distances from tree to tree, more than 6 feet in a single leap. 'It's incredibly rewarding to see red-tailed phascogales back in the wild in Scotia after more than a century,' Mark Smith, the conservation manager at Zoos South Australia, said in the release. 'This release is the culmination of years of dedicated work by the Zoos SA team to breed this remarkable species for conservation. Working with the AWC has allowed us to take that next vital step — moving animals from behind-the-scenes care into wild landscapes where they belong.' Scotia Wildlife Sanctuary is in western New South Wales in southeastern Australia, about a 330-mile drive northeast from Adelaide.
The Guardian
29-05-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
‘A significant disaster': extreme floods risk conservation efforts in outback Queensland
When heavy monsoonal rain was forecast in north Queensland at the beginning of February, Josh McAllister and his family headed to Townsville to stock up on supplies. As the rain came down, his partner and kids did the bolt to home on Australian Wildlife Conservancy's (AWC) Mt Zero-Taravale wildlife sanctuary, 80km to the north-west, taking with them the groceries. McAllister stayed in town to complete a few jobs. By the time McAllister reached Mt Zero-Taravale later the same day, the road to the house was cut with flood water. Making it to a shed on the property he jumped in a side-by-side buggy and went cross-country, only to find these tracks, too, were cut by rising water. He returned to the shed. 'I had grabbed a salad roll and a bag of Doritos before I left town and that's all the food I had,' McAllister says. Scrounging around in the back of his ute he added six small tins of tuna to his supplies. 'I found some hessian bags that we use for animal traps and laid them on a work bench for a bed, and I figured I could go without food for a week. I had shelter and a Starlink connection, and water wasn't a problem, but straight away I was preparing for a potential longer-term stay.' After three days, a break in the rain allowed McAllister to get the buggy through creeks to home. It was the first of five major flooding events on the east coast this year, the latest of which, in northern New South Wales, killed five people, affected 10,000 properties and destroyed 800 homes. The damage at Mt Zero-Taravale is less devastating, but could spell trouble to come in protecting Australia's native species in the most remote and changeable landscapes. McAllister is the manager at Mt Zero-Taravale in Gugu Badhun Country, where a feral predator-proof fence protects a reintroduced population of endangered northern bettongs in a 950-hectare exclosure. Sign up to receive Guardian Australia's fortnightly Rural Network email newsletter 'Northern bettongs have been identified as one of the top 20 animals to go extinct in the next 10 years,' McAllister says. AWC built the fence in 2023 with cyclones and monsoonal deluges in mind, with breakaway sections over creeks – and in February, they broke. 'Debris built up along these sacrificial sections, but they did what they were designed to do and broke away,' McAllister says. 'The fence was open for a week and then we were able to get in and do temporary repairs.' Reassuringly, the 52 cameras placed within the reserve have not detected any incursion by feral predators. The deluge has temporarily helped with weed control, flushing the lantana, a prickly flowering shrub listed as a weed of national significance, out of the creeks. Down on Naree Station Reserve, on Budjiti Country 130km north-west of Bourke in northern NSW, the Bush Heritage Australia (BHA) ecologist Bridget Roberts has a similar tale. SES crews were air-dropping mail and supplies to her after floods in western Queensland in April. But Roberts considers herself lucky. 'As a conservation property, we don't have responsibilities such as moving cattle or concern about what they're going to eat afterwards; this has been a significant disaster for a lot of people,' she says. Like McAllister, Roberts will have fences to fix and roads and erosion to repair but she sees first-hand the ecological bounty of a big flood in channel country, especially with a three-eyed crustacean known as a shield shrimp. Sign up to The Rural Network Subscribe to Calla Wahlquist's fortnightly update on Australian rural and regional affairs after newsletter promotion The shield shrimp, 8-9cm long, lays eggs that can survive in dry soil for more than seven years and can withstand temperatures of nearly 100C. When the rains come the eggs hatch, and the shrimp embark on a frenzied speed-breeding cycle. 'Within a day or two, they've moved through their larval stage and look like tiny versions of their adult self,' Roberts says. 'In about two weeks, they're at maturity and breeding. They live fast and die young because they're basically racing the puddles. They need to complete their life cycle before the water dries out.' In a quirk of nature, the eggs of the shield shrimp need to dry out before they can hatch. 'They go into diapause, which basically means they pause development of the embryo until conditions are just right.' The shrimp bring benefits for the environment, recycling nutrients as they gobble all in their path, and providing food for birds, which will arrive en masse for a major breeding event. Naree protects the strategic inland wetlands of the Cuttaburra Channels and Yantabulla Swamp. 'There are a lot of wetlands filling now, but with any luck the birds will choose our swamp, and we'll see them in all their glory,' she says. BHA has properties across flood-affected parts of Queensland, in the desert country around Boulia and Bedourie and on the Diamantina River south-west of Winton, all of which have been cut off in floods so far this year. As floods become more common and more extreme in the climate crisis, BHA's executive manager of science and conservation, Rebecca Spindler, says those ecosystems, which have evolved for the occasional flood, may struggle to recover. 'The extent and longevity of these floods will take more native species with them as the severity increases with climate change,' she says. 'Our science helps us find properties that have natural terrain features that hold water in the dry and provide refuge in the deluge.' Spindler says the receding waters will see predators target vulnerable wildlife and weeds flourish, requiring vigilant monitoring by reserve managers and ecologists as soon as access is possible. Sign up for the Rural Network email newsletter
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Rare Aussie creatures photographed coming to surface for 'super cool' battle
Rare images show ordinarily shy marsupials engaging in a fierce battle in the early morning hours. While it's common to see kangaroos boxing each other, there's a reason we don't often see greater bilbies engaging in the same behaviour. There aren't many of them. The pictures were taken at a predator-proof sanctuary created by Australian Wildlife Conservancy (AWC), which keeps small mammals safe from invasive cats and foxes. Dr Alexandra Ross, an ecologist who studies greater bilby behaviour, said the animals are so sparsely populated, it's uncommon to see two together. 'I find it exciting to have two in one shot, and then to have them fighting is super cool… they're showing a behaviour that would be normal, but we don't see it because they're so rare,' she told Yahoo News. Bilbies can share ranges and warrens, but large numbers don't live together, and they are known to be territorial. At least one of the bilbies is a male, and so Ross and the AWC team believe the images may capture a territorial dispute. 'The greater bilby used to cover around 80 per cent of Australia, but its range has declined by 80 per cent. They're super rare, but they're not supposed to be. They're supposed to be a common species,' she said. Before Europeans arrived in Australia, it would have been common to hear the sounds of greater bilbies throughout Central Australia, extending across to Adelaide and Perth. Today, their range is limited to isolated pockets of Western Australia and the Northern Territory. 'These two bilbies fighting should be a common sight outside your bedroom window, but we have to go to all this effort now so they can exist,' Ross said. 📸 Sad story behind viral image highlights Australia's invasive species crisis 😳 Grim discovery in abandoned fishing trap near popular track 🌏 Air crew makes exciting 'once-in-a-lifetime' discovery in outback The footage was taken in the Northern Territory at Newhaven Wildlife Sanctuary, a 261,501 hectare property that's home to 14 species threatened with extinction. Because native marsupials evolved without any evolutionary recognition of cats or foxes, in the wild, those that can't quickly learn are quickly killed. Inside the sanctuary, there is some evidence that their wary behaviour changes because they don't have to be on the lookout for introduced predators. 'Once you've got the cats and foxes out, you can bring back the native species that used to be in the area, and then they do spectacularly well. 'They're meant to be here, so as soon as you give them a chance, they do great.' Love Australia's weird and wonderful environment? 🐊🦘😳 Get our new newsletter showcasing the week's best stories.
