Dear members and friends,
Thank you to everyone who assisted on Saturday to locate the local koalas in and around the Toondah Harbour area.
In total, 19 healthy koalas were sighted including 5 babies and 1 juvenile. All of these koalas were within a one and a half kilometre range of GJ Walter Park in Shore St East, Cleveland.
This is great news leading up to the beginning of the GPS tracking project planned to start in October this year.
The critical thing now is to keep increasing the funding as the more money we raise, the more koalas can be tracked for a longer period of time. Ideally the koalas should be monitored during the breeding season (July-December) and the non-breeding season (January-June).
KAG is planning to engage the services of Endeavour Veterinary Ecology P/L who have completed numerous other tracking projects in SEQ. GPS collars will be fitted to individual koalas and base stations strategically placed in the area will automatically download their movements twice per day.
This valuable data will show where the koalas are moving each day, which roads they are crossing and the habitat trees that are most frequented. Importantly the data will provide vital information on each koala’s home range (territory) which may be impacted on by the proposed Toondah Harbour development at Cleveland.
We understand that decisions will be made later this year and feel it’s critically important to gather scientific information so that the koalas that live in and around the Toondah area are better understood and seriously considered with any future planning of the area.
Please consider supporting the tracking project by going to – http://www.chuffed.org/project/help-save-our-toondah-koalas
or email admin@koalagroup.asn.au for direct debit details.
Feel free to pass this onto family and friends who may be interested in helping.
