![]() Prof Corey Bradshaw, an ecologist at Flinders University, has been speaking to scientific colleagues on the ground and said they had grave concerns for the dunnarts and the cockatoos. He said “probably more than half” of the island’s koalas would have perished in the fires, but it was “a guessing game”. Mitchell said some islanders had considered the koalas a pest as their numbers had grown as high as 50,000. It’s also known as the Casuarina cockatoo, because it feeds almost exclusively on the seeds of the casuarina, or 'she oak' trees. Koalas thrived on the island, and there is a government program to reduce their numbers. The Glossy Black-Cockatoo is the smallest of the five black-cockatoos, with a brown-black head, neck and body, with red or orange-red tail panels. ![]() The introduced koalas were free from chlamydia – a disease prevalent among mainland populations that can cause blindness, infertility and death. Kangaroo Island glossy black-cockatoos are a subspecies to those found in eastern Australia and are found exclusively on Kangaroo Island. Description: Carnabys cockatoo is a brownish black. Koalas were introduced to the island in the 1920s in response to a drop in numbers on the mainland from the fur trade. It is classed as endangered under the Federal Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. Injured kangaroos, wallabies and pygmy possums had also been brought to the park, which was in the process of setting up larger treatment areas for the injured animals. For some the burns are just too extreme.” “We are seeing many burns to hands and feet – fingernails melted off. “At least a third of what has been brought in we’ve had to euthanise unfortunately,” he said. Sam Mitchell, co-owner of the Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park, told Guardian Australia residents had been delivering injured animals to them, including about 50 koalas. Photograph: Kangaroo Island Land for Wildlife Ecologist Pat Hodgens hold up burned wildlife-monitoring cameras. ![]()
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