A koala caught on film north-west of Mt Kembla has given hope the native marsupial is moving back towards the Illawarra escarpment after an 80 year absence.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
It is the first time in decades a koala has been spotted in bushland close to the Illawarra escarpment and was only captured by accident when an infrared camera placed 5.5 kms north-west of Mt Kembla in the hope of spotting the endangered Southern Brown Bandicoot, instead captured footage of the koala at 3.37am on August 22.
A NSW Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) spokesperson said koalas were thought to have become extinct to the area in the 1930s when land was cleared for agriculture.
OEH has previously identified the area above the escarpment in the Metropolitan Special Area drinking water catchment, as potential habitat for koalas in a habitat modelling study from 2007, as the trees and soils are highly suitable for the animals. The spokesperson said the habitat had now grown back and it appeared koalas were finding it again.
"It's the first koala photographed along the eastern edge of the Woronora Plateau in the vicinity of the Illawarra escarpment for many many decades, so to see a koala and those bright shining eyes is a fantastic sight to see," he said.
“They had not been seen in the Wollongong LGA since early last century. However, this project and another OEH project focussing on koalas in Wingecarribee Shire have found koalas at low densities through other parts of the water catchments.
“Populations in the catchments appear to be expanding from population centres at Campbelltown and Avon.
“This koala has likely walked the 20-30km from these populations and rediscovered a patch of very good koala habitat above the escarpment at Mt Kembla.
“The recording of a koala above the escarpment is a positive sign of a potential future population.”
A Facebook post by In Search of the Illawarra Koala, a group dedicated to the protection of the koala, has heralded the footage as “brilliant news.”
“It is with absolute excitement and joyous tears that we have the honour of announcing that only a few weeks ago a Kembla koala was sighted alive and well on a camera trap survey,” the post proclaims. “Please like, comment and share this amazing news for#koalaprotectionact.”
