Protecting koalas through habitat restoration

Local Land Services Protecting Koalas through habitat restoration project is supporting koalas by: 

• focusing on recovery actions to support populations 

• restoring and improving habitat on private land.

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Video transcript

Protecting Koalas on the North Coast, NSW

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small and large they are part of

the ecosystem so therefore they are part

of me

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the best part about the local Land

Services koala project has been working

with the amazing land holders

contractors and traditional owners on

this beautiful country between Coffs

Harbor and Port Macquarie on gumbangia

dungari and beer pie country

okay

so the ball let him know that we're

working

and let him know what job we're on today

thanks

koala

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this is indication to me that you found

something

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Wallace like to take the path of police

resistance so if there's a nice open

pathway they'll walk along that and

they'll also drop a lot of Scat as they

walk to

so the best way to find koalas is to

look for their poo and with help from

the dogs as well you can help identify

koala scat by this lovely shape they're

very rarely Jelly Bean shaped so they're

often this

uh straight pallet they're very dense

and you can see here very fine material

so there's no bugs or any other seed

material

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s

my wife and I purchased this property

about two years ago with the idea of

re-vegetating and regenerating a couple

of different forms of forest one is

lowland subtropical rainforest which

we're sitting in right now on floodplain

it's a endangered ecological community

so it's worthy of some protection some

pretty urgent protection but also we're

very keen to facilitate the restoration

of some wet and dry chlorophyll Forest

which we have on the back of the

property and some Rolling Hills to the

south of where we are at the moment and

the idea behind that was to re-establish

some koala habitat this area was once

what's known as primary koala habitat

which is the best of koala habitats but

unfortunately it's become over time very

fragmented due to agricultural practices

so it's called progression progress

progress progress progress so much for

progress you know so in the process of

progress we destroy and lose the Laura

the land we lose a lot of the spaces

lose a lot of tree cutting down the poem

let alone we climb up there don't get

watercolor the leaf see that's where you

get his water no we don't get the water

on the ground we get the water from me

leave yeah

and that's how he survives

for the impact of

progression you know so

the koalas evolved on this country over

the last 40 million years perhaps 60

million years

the white fell has been here for only

250 years and in that time we've

probably lost between 50 and 80 percent

of the habitat for the koala

for me at the heart of the issue is a

moral dilemma

what right do we have to sit on our

hands and watch this beautiful iconic

species known all around the world

slowly fade away to Extinction

we have an obligation

to not allow this to happen but to

actually reverse it

to repair country so the great thing

about the project is that it provides an

alternative opportunity for people who

want to do that a little bit for nature

who want to improve habitat quality

across the landscape if you want to

improve water quality and stability of

riparian zones it provides them with

that opportunity to get assistance from

the government to re-vegetate provide

quality habitat for koalas and other

keystone species and to basically feel

good about doing their bit to Nature I

know that may sound cheesy but it's come

coming from me it feels very very

satisfying in my own situation I find it

extremely worthwhile one of the most

worthwhile things that I've ever done

some people have said Martin you're

obsessed with koalas but I like the

koala as much as I like every other

native animal I'm responsible for

there's a wide range of native animals

that will benefit from habitat creation

we Embark upon for the benefit of the

koala the beauty of working in private

land conservation is that we are

supporting not only diverse vegetation

types but also diverse land holder needs

and aspirations for their patch yeah

within the first night that we set traps

we picked up two foxes a male and a

female and then on the second night we

picked up another two foxes and we've

seen a few cat tracks as well so

see how this one goes

as much as they're a beautiful animal

they're just not meant to be here

they're just doing too much damage not

only to koalas but every other small

species okay so these traps are actually

rubber jawed lined so if you get

non-target animals whether domestic or

even native we can release these animals

and you just yeah give their foot a

little bit of a rub and massage they

will have a solid foot for a couple of

days but there's no breakages and

we've recently done a a fire management

Workshop local Land Services or part of

the program bought an indigenous Ranger

who also spoke about cultural burning so

that was really interesting and

something that we can look at

in the future if if needed because the

whole idea is is protecting these

pockets of of rainforest and Euclid

forests that I've got here to to give

refuge for the animals

at the end of the day it is so inspiring

to watch Land holders be supported to

take the next step in koala conservation

and to realize by looking after koala

you're not only helping biodiversity on

your block but you're also increasing

the productivity of your land for future

Generations yeah

so the reason we um we engaged with

local Land Services is that after the

fires have happened a lot of koalas are

now frequented in our area and are

spotted throughout the whole of

Southwest rocks I feel like they've come

here because it's there you know they

wanted to find a safe home and so now

they call you know this place their home

so it's really special that we get to

share our home here it's such a

beautiful part of dungari country with

our yashi koalas yeah and that's a part

you know we say that's a part of our

dreaming not just as dungari people but

that's a part of our dreaming as the

whole of Southwest rocks now like

they've come back here so now it's time

for us to protect their home

and we sing a song about dungi himself

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that's the song we got in goombanga so

we're gonna put that into a

lingo language

so

anyway so we've got a lot of contention

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it's incredibly enriching to my life in

a spiritual sense I'm an Australian I

have a deep connection to Country I

think anyone that is lucky enough to be

in this country and is open to Wild

Spaces and spends time in World spaces

is imbued with that core element that

makes the nation's character a

connection to Country

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Project objectives

This project will:

• improve and protect koala habitat
• Increase koala populations across Areas of Regional Koala Significance (ARKS)
• engage with landholders and community to encourage koala conservation.

Project background

The koala is listed as Endangered by State and Commonwealth conservation departments.  

A growing human population, particularly in areas along Australia’s east coast, has led to large-scale clearing of better-quality koala habitats with many koala populations struggling within smaller, fragmented patches of poorer quality habitat.  

Other threats impacting koala populations include:

• drought
• fire
• climate change
• disease
• vehicle strike  
• dog attack.

Project delivery

Local Land Services is working with private landholders who are interested in restoring and maintaining natural assets on their land. Project delivery includes:

• technical native vegetation restoration advice
• site assessment and management planning
• funding of restoration works to improve koala habitat on property.

Work underway

• Controlling environmental weeds in key habitat areas.
• Installing fences to control impacts from livestock and wildlife friendly fencing.
• Planting (revegetation) koala food trees and other important forest building and habitat species.
• Fire management planning and activities to protect habitat from wildfire and/or undertake ecological burning to improve koala habitat.

How to get involved

North Coast Local Land Services are encouraging anyone in the North Coast to log koala sightings in the NSW Government Citizen Science application - I Spy Koala. The app allows community members to record details about their sightings of koalas including:

• location  
• condition of the koala
• photos  
• and other information.

Data from the app will be available for access through the interactive NSW Government Sharing and Enabling Environmental Data (SEED) portal. The SEED Portal was developed with and for the community of NSW as a central place for everyone to find data about the environment.