Koala advocates, volunteers, and carers launched Koala Alliance Victoria – a new alliance founded to save Victoria’s koalas – on Wednesday, May 3: Wild Koala Day.
Janine Duffy, from Koala Clancy, is one of the members of the new Koala Alliance Victoria.
“We formed this alliance because we couldn’t stand it any longer; there has to be a group to investigate and rebut Victorian government misinformation about koalas,” Ms Duffy said.
“A koala living in the You Yangs is likely to die from drought or a heatwave, or starvation as her trees die due to climate change. A koala living in Mallacoota is lucky to have survived the 2019-2020 mega-fires and is likely to face another one in her lifetime.
“Our koalas are vanishing, and the government is not doing enough. They are even dragging their heels and are yet to release their much heralded Koala Management Strategy, which is years overdue.”
According to Melinda Darer of Friends of Alberton West, koala numbers in the region are waning.
“We have less than two thousand koalas left in our region,” Ms Darer said.
“On the Mornington Peninsula, a koala is likely to die from starvation as her trees are cut down due to lax planning laws.
“Nobody at the local or state government level seems to be concerned, but there should be alarms going off everywhere.”
The state government reports Victoria has a relatively high koala population compared to Queensland, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory, where koala populations are listed as vulnerable to extinction under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.
According to Forest Fire Management Victoria, Victoria’s koala population is large and thriving.
Jessica Robertson from Ballarat Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation has questioned the government’s sources, claiming Victoria’s koala population is not large and thriving.
“We’d like to know why the government says koalas are ‘abundant’; where is this data coming from?” Ms Robertson said.
“I know that in my area, there has not been any research or monitoring on koala abundance for many decades. It puzzles me why more do not question this claim of ‘abundance’ when everyone I speak to says the same thing, where have all the koalas gone?
“Koalas in this state are not ‘abundant’ at all,” she said.
“They are being forced to crowd into ever smaller, shrinking fragments of habitat. This is not an abundance of koalas; it is pressure from habitat loss. This is leading to starvation and disease on top of all the other threats they face.
“Calls on the government from koala carers and rescuers, researchers and citizen science groups to investigate shocking koala declines go unanswered, while more koalas disappear every year.”