It was two years ago, March 2007, when Friends of the Koala presented a submission to Lismore City Council putting forward the benefits of a radio tracking study in the urban areas of Lismore and Goonellabah.

 

The study was to include both rehabilitated and wild koalas. The aims were to gather information to assist with the management of both our urban, wild populations as well as allowing us an opportunity to follow through on the long term outcomes of rehabilitated koalas.

 

Council agreed to include the study in its 2007-2008 Budget. This provided the funds for purchase of 10 radio tracking collars and support from Nick Stephens, Council’s Natural Resource Management Officer in helping us to get the project up and going.

 

Ross Goldingay, Senior Lecturer in Wildlife Ecology at Southern Cross University came on board to supervise the project which included applying for the approval and licensing of the study from the relevant authorities: the Southern Cross University Animal Ethics Committee and the Department of Environment and Climate Change, respectively.

 

Ross has extensive experience in radio tracking, particularly with gliders. SCU has helped us out with the use of a receiver – a costly piece of equipment. The Australian Wildlife Hospital also came on board offering advice on which collars to purchase and agreeing to give full health checks and fit the collars on any koalas suitable for tracking.

 

Ross spent time writing the applications needed for the approvals process. The first, from the Animal Ethics Committee, came through in March 2008. It took a bit longer for the DECC Licence to come through in July.

 

The collars arrived in time for our AGM in mid-August last year which was quite useful considering the speaker, Deidre de Villiers was talking about radio tracking koalas.

We were now all ready to go – just needed some koalas.

 

Mathew was our first candidate. I had been sent a photo via email of a koala on one of our member’s properties. When I saw the photo I was worried about the fur loss around his eyes and that he was hanging-out low in the trees. I asked for a rescuer to go out to have a look at him as the koala was tagged but the photo was not clearly showing what was causing the fur loss. The koala was easily caught and taken to the Care Centre.

 

When we looked up his tag number it was Mathew who we had only released a few months prior. The fur loss around the eyes was from when he had been in care for conjunctivitis and was now growing back.

 

Mathew was sent to the Australian Wildlife Hospital to ensure the conjunctivitis had not returned and that all was well with his health. He was given the thumbs up to have a collar fitted and released back to the exact same tree where we picked him up from on Gundarimba Rd, East Lismore last September.

 

Several months later and Mathew is proving to be the koala that is moving around the most so far. He is also the one to have been spotted with other koalas. The fur around his eyes has now completely grown back and he is looking great. Even has a little girlfriend every now and then.

 

Ashley Radio Tracking Data MapAshley was the second koala to be fitted with a collar. This boy was picked up in the middle of Ballina Rd near Kadina High School. This road is the main road into Lismore from the coast, is four lanes wide and very busy. There were no health problems with Ashley. He was brought in for observation and was fitted with a collar and released into Kadina Park last November.

 

So far Ashley is moving across either side of the road on a regular basis. He is 6 years old, so chances are he has been doing this for the last 6 years. He is known to most residents on both sides of the road we have spoken to. We don’t know how he is doing it or at what time of day but at least he appears to be crossing where the sign says ‘koalas cross here’.

 

Amaya was our first girl to get a collar. She was found in a suburban yard with a dog barking at her. There was saliva on her back so we suspected the dog had attacked her. She was given a full assessment and treated for this before a final health check at AWH where her collar was fitted. She was released in January into a park at the back of the house where she was found. It is amazing how many small pockets of bushland are available in Lismore/Goonellabah when a koala needs to be released.

 

So far Amaya has stayed within the park, moving up and down the row of trees bordering an oval. It is a bit of a weird experience tracking this girl – the park looks out onto an urban landscape, there are dogs barking in almost every backyard. It is a little pocket of trees with nothing to connect it to any other pockets without having to cross roads and go through yards. She has not been seen with any other koalas and stays very high in the trees.

 

Elizabeth koala with radio tracking collar at releaseElizabeth is the second girl to get a collar. She came into care after a dog had her bailed- up a fence. She was not bitten by the dog but had mild conjunctivitis so needed to be treated for this. She responded well to treatments and was very keen to go after a full health check at AWH and her collar was fitted.

 

She was released in February 50m or so away from where she was found in a beautiful stand of large koala food trees. This stand links up to a larger area of bush and also connects to another corridor. Despite having these areas to move into, so far Elizabeth has not moved more than a tree or two away from where she was released.

 

The batteries on the collars last for two years. The koalas will need to be brought in to have the collars removed or have the batteries replaced so they can be tracked for a further period. If for some reason we are unable to catch them before the batteries run out the collars have an elastic insert which will rot and the collar will fall off by itself. The collars are also fitted so if they were to snag on anything they would easily slip and the koala would suffer no harm. So far we have not had any problems with the collars and the koalas tolerate them well.

 

The approval and licence need renewal each year. We are excited to say the SCU Animal Ethics Committee has just given us the go ahead to continue the project for another year.

 

Ideally we hope that the next two collars fitted will be on koalas living around the Care Centre and surrounding habitat including the grounds of Lismore High School and SCU, but this will depend on what koalas come our way.

 

There are lots of people who have put work into this project to make it a success including the volunteers who are going out each week, equipment in hand to search for these koalas - thankyou to you all.

 

The information we have gained has already been beneficial and interesting so it will be really exciting to see what develops once we have accrued a few years’ worth of data.

This story is from Treetops March 2009 - the Friends of the Koala Newsletter. To read other stories and issues of Treetops click here .