Western Australia is seeing the return of western quolls to the wild after disappearing from the state over 100 years ago.
These long-snouted furry mammals are part of Australia’s large variety of predatory marsupials who raise their young in chest pouches, live in burrows and dens, and hunt at night.
In the vast 1,305 km² of Mount Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary in Western Australia, 30 western quolls were released earlier this year, and conservationists are already seeing them fan out, settle wide areas, and reproduce.
The Mount Gibson reserve was the sight of the largest single reintroduction effort in Australian history, with 10 different animals all being reintroduced to the area—an enormous achievement for the Australian Wildlife Conservancy which oversaw the project.
“We’re detecting them lots, finding them in dens, and we’ve now detected females with pouch young, so we’ve had some successful breeding,” said senior field ecologist Georgina Anderson. “We’re hoping those young will continue to grow and contribute to the population.”
Before their release, 16 of the quolls were fitted with radio tracking collars. While common in conservation in everything from large snakes to small birds, it’s the first time this method has ever been employed to study western quolls.
It will allow them to track multiple quolls simultaneously, and learn where they’re living and hunting within the reserve.
MORE AUSTRALIAN NEWS:
While many are still endangered, some Australian mammals are recovering in the largest numbers ever recorded. This includes animals like the talperoo, a tiny bandicoot that was returned to Stuart National Park after 100 years of absence.
Recently, Australia’s Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act determined that 15 mammals previously in need of protection have now recovered enough to no longer require sweeping legal protections and conservation.
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