The critically endangered population of southern Brush-tailed Rock-wallabies in the Little River Gorge in far East Gippsland is growing, thanks to many years of dedicated work by staff from the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP), Parks Victoria, Zoos Victoria, Adelaide Zoo, Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve and local environmental consultants Wildlife Unlimited.
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DELWP Natural Environment Officer, Marc Perri said: “This is the only natural population in Australia for the southern Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby.
“In 2005, this remote colony consisted of an estimated 10 animals - there are now 41 known animals, identified through an ongoing program of camera monitoring, trapping and tagging,” Mr Perri said.
“Over the past year, 30 of those were trapped and had a health check, with 19 previously unchecked animals having tissue samples collected and measurements taken.
“We’re particularly excited to see stability in the population, with 13 animals less than two years old observed – this is a high percentage of young animals, balancing out the loss of older wallabies.
“There are now more breeding age females in the gorge than at any time in the past 30 years, which is really good news and bodes well for the future growth of the colony.
“In 2016 we sent two of our young males to the Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve’s captive breeding program, where they are now breeding, and we translocated a young female there earlier this year to contribute to the program.
“It’s been a great year in the field, with the delivery of a significant body of work to support the recovery of the southern Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby in East Gippsland and nationally.
“That work includes ongoing predator control through baiting and predator monitoring with the Southern Ark program and Parks Victoria. Predation is the most significant threat to rock-wallabies so this is the highest priority activity.
“We also refurbished some of our remote cameras after four years of continuous service, placed new purpose-built traps at new sites in the north and east of the gorge and continued with our annual camera monitoring and cage trapping program.
“Genetic analysis collected from the trapping helps us identify priority animals for the captive breeding program and to build a family tree of the population to manage the quality of their genetic pool.
“We couldn’t do all this work without the tireless support of many individuals, groups and partner organisations. In particular, the Wildlife Unlimited team, the Southern Ark team, Parks Victoria staff, Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve, Mt Rothwell's Biodiversity Centre and the National Recovery Team.
“To everyone else who has made a contribution, and there have been many, well done on supporting a really good year’s work with encouraging results.”