About us

Endangered wallabies found in Warrumbungles post-fire

Media release: 5 February 2013

The Office of Environment and Heritage was excited to discover that some of the colony of brush-tailed rock-wallabies have survived the fire which has devastated the Warrumbungle National Park.

OEH Senior Threatened Species Officer Dr Todd Soderquist said the discovery, captured on remote motion-sensing cameras, was a positive sign.

“We were hopeful that some of the Warrumbungle brush-tailed rock-wallabies survived the fire and our National Parks and Wildlife Service staff moved quickly to put equipment in the field to see what it would pick up.

“We placed some infra-red cameras in locations where we thought survivors might be and laid out feed to draw them to the cameras.

“We are pleased to now discover the cameras have picked up photographs of what we believe to be four different animals, telling us we do have survivors among a colony that we have been monitoring for the past decade.

“Many local people as well as organisations such as the World Wide Fund for Nature and the Waterfall Springs Wildlife Sanctuary have been dedicated partners with us in trying to protect the Warrumbungle colonies of this endangered species and I’m sure they will be pleased to hear this news.

“The animals that have been captured on camera appear to be healthy two weeks after the fire went through their habitat.

“They were discovered in the area where a translocation, involving the release of captive bred brush-tailed rock-wallabies, occurred in 2009.

It appears likely some of that translocation group survived along with rock-wallabies native to the site.

“The brush-tailed rock-wallaby was once common in rocky habitat throughout south-eastern Australia but numbers have plummeted in the last 200 years and the species is now endangered nationally.

“We will continue to monitor the motion-sensing cameras in coming weeks in the hope of finding more brush-tailed rock-wallabies and other wildlife species, and expand our searches to other rock-wallaby colony sites in the Warrumbungles,” Dr Soderquist said.

Pic: http://tinyurl.com/bxogcwc

 

Contact: Jacki Roberts

Page last updated: 07 March 2014