Koalas how many are left

Tabart said the country needs a koala protection law. I know that it can just sound like this endless story of dearth and destruction, but these figures are right.

They're probably worse," she told Reuters. The decline in New South Wales likely accelerated after huge swathes of forest were devastated in bushfires in late and early , but some of those areas already had no koalas. The plight of the defenseless animals has sparked a flurry of concern—and confusion.

Koalas are considered vulnerable to extinction —just a step above endangered—and reports indicate that between and a thousand koalas have been found dead so far in fire-devastated zones of northern New South Wales. But, experts say, we are not looking at the death of a species—yet. When it comes to fire, everything seems to be stacked against koalas. Their only real defense is climbing higher into the eucalyptus trees where they make their homes—little defense at all in a raging forest fire.

Eucalyptus itself is some of the most fire-adapted vegetation on Earth, able to sprout and grow anew in the immediate aftermath of fires. The scale of the current fires—largely a result of climate change and the slow death of Aboriginal fire management methods—has no precedent, according to Bowman. Packed with oil, the trees are burning hot and fast, sometimes exploding and sending sparks yards in every direction.

He worries that the situation will be far worse come in January and February, as temperatures continue to rise and drought is exacerbated. In , experts estimated that there are about , koalas in Australia , which represents an average of a 24 percent decline in populations over the past three generations.

Koalas are threatened by land development, food degradation increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has diminished the nutritional quality of eucalyptus leaves , drought, dog attacks, and chlamydia. Read more about the threats posed by cars and dogs. And, yes, fire too. The recent bushfires in New South Wales and Queensland cover about a million hectares, Fisher says and some estimates indicate as many as 2.

Learn more: What is extinction? The answer is complicated. The headlines claiming that koalas are functionally extinct appear to be based on a claim from a koala conservation group earlier in A third of koalas in the fire zones there may have perished. But other populations, such as those in the southern state of Victoria, have not been affected by these fires at all, according to Johnson.

Almost nothing. In the meantime, The Koala Hospital of Port Macquarie , located about miles north of Sydney in one of the most fire-affected zones, is actively rescuing and treating koalas. We know that at least some koala populations in urban areas are suffering in this way, and genetic studies on the Koala Coast, located 20kms south-east of Brisbane, show that the population is suffering from reduced genetic variation. In South East Queensland, koalas in some areas have experienced catastrophic declines.

Read more: Safe passage: we can help save koalas through urban design. Exhaustive multi-disciplinary koala research continues apace in an effort to find ways of protecting wild koala populations and ensuring that they remain viable now and into the future.

Habitat loss, population dynamics, genetics, disease, diet and climate change are some key areas being studied. Koalas are not stationary, are patchily distributed throughout an extremely wide range encompassing urban and rural areas in four states and one territory, and are usually difficult to see.

To determine whether each population of koalas scattered across eastern Australia is functionally extinct would require a gargantuan effort. In , in an attempt to determine population trends for the koala within the four states, a panel of 15 koala experts used a structured, four-step question format to estimate bioregional population sizes of koalas, and changes in those sizes.

Since May , koalas have been listed as vulnerable in Queensland, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory because populations in these regions have declined significantly or are at risk of doing so. In the southern states of Victoria and South Australia, koala populations vary widely from abundant to low or locally extinct.