Nowhere is collapsing koala numbers better documented than on Queensland’s Koala Coast which encompasses the bayside portions of the Redland, Brisbane and Logan local government areas.

Whilst the locality is urbanising rapidly, it also contains semi-rural settings, large areas of contiguous bushland and a major koala population by any standard. To the government’s credit, funding has enabled tracking programs and population monitoring over a period of some 12 years.

The Department of Environment and Resource Management (DERM) report, Decline of the Koala Coast Koala Population: Population Status 2008, has just been released. It paints an horrific picture of a koala population on the brink.

In 1996 -1999 there was an estimated 6,246 koalas. By 2005-6 the number had dropped to 4,611. In 2008 numbers dropped even further to 2,279. That’s a 64% overall decline in a little more than a decade.

The largest losses, 59%, occurred in bushland areas compared with a reduction of 30% in urban areas. That may sound surprising. The studies are demonstrating a dynamic process operating between the urban and bushland koalas, the latter relying on the former for recruitment. Mortality in urban areas, together with the impact of excessive habitat loss are the reasons for the higher loss rate experienced in bushland areas.

We do not have comparable data sets for the Northern Rivers, however we do have a few localised studies (somewhat ironically undertaken for ecological assessments associated with development applications), the records of rehabilitation groups like Friends of the Koala and the sadly incomplete NSW Wildlife Atlas.

On the basis of this suite of documentation we believe it’s not unreasonable to conclude that trends similar to those on the Koala Coast are being experienced in our coastal regions as well. Scary stuff for the koalas and us!

Read the full report at http://www.epa.qld.gov.au/publications/p02966aa.pdf/

Decline_of_the_Koala_Coast_Koala_Population_Population_Status_in_2008.pdf