Eastern bettong returns to mainland Australia

Thanks again to Brad Wolfe for spotting and sharing this great news.

A rare marsupial long disappeared from Australia's mainland is now thriving near Canberra, with reports the population is fat and happy.

Last year a group of 17 eastern bettongs were brought to protected forest areas in Canberra from Tasmania, their first appearance on the mainland for 80 years.

Adrian Manning, from the Australian National University, says health checks show the small members of the kangaroo family are faring well, with about 35 bettongs leaving the pouch and about 20 more young on the way.

"They've hit the ground running, digging for truffles - which is what they do - and they've actually put weight on" he said.

"The fact that six months in, most of the animals seem to be doing well, putting on weight, breeding, those are all signs that they're happy.

"I don't think we could really have expected any better than we've got, so the whole team's really pleased."

This year, researchers will examine how the bettongs adapt to the environment, and what affect they have on the ecosystem.

And there are plans to eventually move some of the bettongs to sanctuaries and restoration projects in other parts of south-east Australia.

New species discovered off Australian coast

A new species of venomous sea snake mysteriously covered head to tail in spiny scales has been discovered in treacherous seas off northern Australia, according to a new study.

Though some other sea snakes have spiky scales on their bellies, "no other [known] sea snake has this curious feature," study leader Kanishka Ukuwela, an ecologist at the University of Adelaide, said by email.

Normally snakes have smooth scales, but each of the newly named Hydrophis donaldi's scales has a spiny projection, he said.

Scientists cruising shallow seagrass beds in the Gulf of Carpentaria (map) recently captured nine of the rough-scaled reptiles, National Geographic reported.

"The minute the first one landed on the deck, I knew we had something special," study co-author Bryan Fry of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, said by email. "It was quite unlike any of the sea snakes I have seen."

Each of the specimens was found on the rocky seafloor, a habitat that could explain the new species' uniquely strong scales, Fry noted.

Overall, though, "we don't know why this interesting feature evolved in this species, or what they are used for," study leader Ukuwela said.

The new Hydrophis—literally "water serpent"—likely eluded notice for two reasons. The species is apparently rare, and it lives in coastal habitats largely avoided by fishers, Ukuwela said. Many Australian sea snake species live in the open ocean and are often accidentally caught in prawn trawls. (See snake pictures.)

Little is known about the yellowish brown reptile, other than that it gives birth to live young and, like nearly all live-bearing sea snakes, is "venomous and potentially dangerous to humans," according to the study, published February 21 in the journal Zootaxa.

Furthermore, venom is just one obstacle to unraveling the new species' mysteries, the University of Queensland's Fry noted.

"Field observations are impossible, because the water is very murky and filled with lots of very large bull sharks and saltwater crocodiles, in addition to [highly poisonous] box jellyfish," he said.

"If we tried to dive there, our life expectancy would be measured in minutes. The only question is which animal would kill us.

"My money is on the bull sharks."

Saving wildlife a full-time job in Australia

Australia Walkabout Wildlife Park is doing its bit when it comes to the fight to save Australia’s endangered and threatened flora and fauna.

It is reported there are 444 species of reptiles, frogs, fish, mammals, birds and other animals listed under the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Act.

Some of Australia’s much loved animals are facing the possibility of heading in the same direction of the extinct Tasmanian Tiger, including the Northern hairy-nosed wombat, southern cassowary, grey headed flying fox, bilby and koala.

According to Australia Walkabout Wildlife Park general manager, Tassin Barnard there are many reasons why so many native species face the possibility of extinction.

“One of the big factors threatening our native wildlife is loss of habitat through the construction of houses and roads,” Ms Barnard said. “I’m not saying don’t build more roads and homes because we need them but maybe we need to think about where we build them and how we are going about it, as not only are the new roads and homes wiping out animals homes it’s also leading to a lack of food sources.”

Other problems according to Ms Barnard are interbreeding, feral animals and a lack of information.

“Information and education are the key because there is a lot of misinformation out there, but the more people learn about these animals it might prompt them to come up with other ideas to help save them,” Ms Barnard said.

Baby quoll no more than a handful

Staff at the Ballarat Wildlife Park are busy giving some tender loving care to a baby quoll abandoned by her mother.

Named “Flare” the 82- day old quoll has quickly become attached to her keepers and is improving rapidly from her ordeal.

A Ballarat Wildlife Park spokesperson said Flare had taken to the bottle and was even beginning to walk around.

“I don’t know why she was abandoned,” the spokesperson said.

“But things are looking positive though, there is still the possibility she may not come through.”

Quolls, she said, belonged to the Tasmanian Devil family and were found mainly in Tasmania.

Papua New Guinea reveals 1000+ new species

A blue-hued Monitor lizard - Varanus Macraei. 

A fanged frog, a dazzling blue monitor lizard, a blind snake and a round-headed dolphin are among more than 1000 new species that have been recently found in Papua New Guinea, the environment group WWF has announced.

Scientists made the astounding discoveries, which included a river shark and dozens of butterflies, at a rate of two a week from 1998 to 2008, WWF said in a report on the island's natural habitat.

"This report shows that New Guinea's forests and rivers are among the richest and most biodiverse in the world," WWF Western Melanesia program representative Neil Stronach said.

PNG's rainforests are the third-biggest in the world after the Amazon and the Congo, and, while the island covers just 0.5 per cent of Earth's land mass, it contains up to 8 per cent of the world's species, according to WWF.

The 1060 species confirmed by scientists as new discoveries between 1998 and 2008 are believed to have only scratched the surface of PNG's dazzling ecosystems.

The round-headed dolphin - Orcaella Heinsohni.

"Such is the extent of New Guinea's biodiversity that new discoveries are commonplace even today," WWF said in its report, titled Final Frontier: Newly Discovered Species of New Guinea.

One of the most notable finds documented in the WWF report was a round-headed and snub-finned dolphin, which swims in protected, shallow coastal waters near rivers and creek mouths.

Discovered in 2005 in PNG, it was the first new dolphin species recorded anywhere in the world in three decades, and is now known to exist in Australia, WWF said.

Another of the 12 mammals found over the decade was an anteater named in honour of British naturalist David Attenborough, Sir David's long-beaked echidna or, scientifically, Zaglossus attenboroughi.

One of the 134 frogs discovered was dubbed Litoria sauroni because its striking red and black spotted eyes reminded scientists of the evil character Sauron in the Lord of the Rings movies.

A large green tree frog - Litoria dux.

Another new frog was notable because of its size -- just 1cm in length -- and one had vampire-like fangs.
Nine snail species were among the 580 new invertebrates discovered.

Among the other new invertebrates was a brightly coloured apricot crayfish, part of the yabby family, which was 9-12cm long.

Discoveries of new fish totalled 71, with a kaleidoscope of colours, including one in the coral reefs of Milne Bay that thrilled scientists with its dazzling blue hue.

WWF said the most extraordinary freshwater discovery was a 2.5m river shark found in PNG that has since also been located in northern Australia.

Of the 43 reptiles discovered, one could claim to be the most innocuous snake in the world. It was just 12-14cm long, could not bite, had no venom and had scales over its eyes so it could not see.

A blue-eyed spotted Cuscus - Spilocuscus Wilsoni.

But WWF said the excitement of all the new discoveries had been tempered by the fact that,
as in the Amazon and Borneo rainforests, human actions were destroying Papua New Guinea's natural habitat at an "alarming rate".

New Guinea is the largest tropical island on Earth and is divided between the countries of Papua New Guinea (PNG) in the East and Indonesia in the West. It contains the third largest tract of rainforest in the world after the Amazon and the Congo. The island covers less than 0.5 per cent of the Earth’s landmass but shelters 6 to 8 per cent of the world’s species. An estimated two-thirds of these species are unique to New Guinea.

“If you look at New Guinea in terms of biological diversity, it is much more like a continent than an island,” says Dr. Stronach. “Scientists found an average of two new species each week from 1998 – 2008 – something nearly unheard of in this day and age,” he says.

 “Despite its remote location, New Guinea’s natural habitats are being lost at an alarming rate. The island’s forests are facing serious threats including logging, mining, wildlife trade and conversion to agriculture, particularly oil palm,” said Dr Susanne Schmitt, New Guinea Programme Manager at WWF-UK.  “As a region with high rates of poverty, it is absolutely essential that New Guinea’s precious reefs, rainforests, and wetlands are not plundered but managed sustainably for future generations”.

In PNG between 1972 and 2002, independent studies have shown that 24 per cent of rainforests were cleared or degraded through logging or subsistence agriculture. Increasingly, demand for palm oil is also destroying many of New Guinea’s most valuable rainforests. Large forest areas on the island (and across the region) are being cleared for oil palm monocultures, destroying critical habitat for many endangered species.

The destruction of these forests, which are usually cleared by burning, releases huge amounts of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere and accelerates climate change. However, many oil palm producers in New Guinea and around the world are pursing certification through the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO. Certified Sustainable Palm Oil (CSPO) guarantees that social and environmental safeguards have been met during production. And importantly, CSPO also assures that high conservation value forests haven’t been cleared.

Holy Honeyeater! Dear Old Boy breaks a record

An endangered helmeted honeyeater bird spotted near Melbourne and aged three times its average lifespan has entered the record books!

The 16-year-old male, nicknamed The Dear Old Boy and recorded as the oldest wild bird of its species, was recently spotted in Yellingbo Nature Conservation Reserve, north-east of Melbourne.

Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) ornithologist Bruce Quin said the bird's age was remarkable given the species' endangered status.

"This bird, born in the wild, has already survived for three times longer than the estimated average lifespan despite the species being critically endangered," he said.

Male helmeted honeyeaters born in the wild at Yellingbo have a life expectancy of about 5.7 years, while females typically live for 4.5 years.

The Dear Old Boy was tagged as a nestling in November 1994 as part of a tracking program of the threatened native species.

"We were a bit worried that he had died late last year because we hadn't seen him for a couple of months," Mr Quin said.

"But he showed up again in the last few months and we are hoping he is still out there."

The DSE believes 75 helmeted honeyeaters are living in the wild in Yellingbo and the state's Bunyip State Park.

Most years since 1995 captive bred helmeted honeyeaters have been released into the wild in the hope of boosting the population.

Mogo Zoo welcomes Sumatran Tiger cubs

Mogo Zoo on the NSW south coast has this week announced the birth of a litter of rare Sumatran tigers, part of the Global Breeding Program for Sumatran Tigers.

Born on 21 August, 2010, the playful cubs - two males and a female - are the offspring of mother Soraya and father Lari, who are deemed genetically valuable members of the Program. They will enjoy their first 'meet the press' moment later this week when media outlets will be able to photograph the little big cats.