21 native animals lost to extinction since 1960s

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Biologists have honoured the twenty-one native animals that Australia has lost to extinction since the 1960s. They've compiled a list of the creatures we've lost hoping to raise awareness of the devastating impact of invasive species.

Transcript

00:00 If you look at the conservation messaging, it's very much that we have to stop habitat

00:06 loss and we have to stop climate change.

00:09 And it is true, we do have to stop those.

00:12 These are two terrible problems for nature in Australia.

00:16 But if you actually look at the extinctions that have happened since 1960, they've nearly

00:23 all been due to invasive species.

00:24 They've been due to diseases, to a wolf snake that got into Australia.

00:29 They've been due to foxes and cats, trout.

00:34 It's only been two extinctions due to habitat loss.

00:38 And so the messaging isn't quite right.

00:40 I mean, there are other reasons to stop climate change and habitat loss, but we need to recognise

00:45 that there's this third massive issue if we are to stem the extinction crisis in Australia.

00:52 That's very much the reason for writing the report.

00:54 OK, so let's take a look back now at some of those animals we've lost.

00:59 First off, the southern gastric brooding frog.

01:02 Where was its habitat and what significantly affected it?

01:06 Look, it was just in southern Queensland in mountain ranges west of the Sunshine Coast.

01:11 And I remember seeing one.

01:12 I just got this dim memory of going out with a friend, Greg Chakura, and he knew them well.

01:18 And I remember him talking about how he was worried about the endangered red goshawks

01:22 in the mountains.

01:23 We never imagined that this common frog he just found under a rock very easily.

01:28 It was just this disease, chytrid fungus, that somehow got into Australia in the 1970s

01:33 and it moved north through Queensland, possibly or probably taken about by water birds moving

01:41 it from river to river.

01:43 And it wiped out six species of frog.

01:47 And we've got other frogs that are highly endangered in different parts of Australia

01:51 that it could take out next, although there's huge efforts to save those frogs.

01:55 So that was quite shocking because the frogs were going extinct from national parks, the

02:01 very places where the levels of protection are the highest.

02:05 But was there anything realistically that could have been done to stop that fungus getting

02:10 into Australia and then doing what it did?

02:13 Look, that's a very interesting question because we know that there are other diseases that

02:19 we don't want to get, like this highly pathogenic avian flu, there's a crayfish plague.

02:24 There are diseases out there.

02:25 I mean, I wrote the report for the Invasive Species Council and we are very concerned

02:30 by the budgetary level of the Biosecurity Service by the Federal Department of Agriculture.

02:36 It is just not adequate and they are prioritising biosecurity of agricultural pests, which I

02:44 guess is understandable, but there's not much left over for a focus on pests of conservation.

02:50 So yes, in terms of the future, what lesson do we learn?

02:54 There has to be an increase in border biosecurity and better strategic focus on what diseases

03:01 are out there that we don't want.

03:03 Government's response so far on highly pathogenic avian influenza, it's been terrible.

03:08 I mean, they've made some kind of commitment to improve that, but we haven't seen the results yet.

03:12 OK, what about the forest skink now?

03:15 Really handsome little animal.

03:17 Yeah, no, I used to be a guide each year on the Christmas Island Bird and Nature Week.

03:24 I'd fly to the island for a week.

03:26 As part of that, the National Park Rangers would show us the other work they were doing

03:31 and they started talking about how all the lizards on the island were disappearing.

03:36 And so they were trying to capture them.

03:38 They weren't sure what was going wrong.

03:40 And so they caught these three species, all of which are now completely extinct in the

03:45 wild, but one of them, the forest skink, they were only able to catch four of them.

03:49 One of them got out as soon as it was caught.

03:52 Two of the others died in captivity.

03:54 And so in September 2013, I'm looking down in this glass vivarium and I'm thinking, this

04:00 is the last member of a species just sitting there in front of me, all frisky and scampering.

04:06 Next year it was dead, species gone.

04:08 I mean, it's just like I've seen two species that have gone extinct.

04:12 You know, when I signed up to be a biologist, I wasn't expecting that.

04:16 I mean, there really is an extinction crisis going on.

04:20 And that once again was a quarantine breach.

04:21 We know it was Asian wolf snakes that reached the island in cargo from Singapore in, I think

04:27 it was the early 1980s.

04:30 And what about the desert bandicoot?

04:33 Look, if you go to Ayers Rock, if you go to Uluru, there's a big cave on the southern side

04:41 of that.

04:42 It's a sacred site.

04:43 It was also used as a roost by dingoes and owls.

04:48 They'd carry prey in there to feed.

04:50 And biologists sifted through all the bones in that cave that went back 100 years or more.

04:55 They found five species of mammal in there that are completely extinct, completely extinct.

05:01 And others that are now only found on offshore islands.

05:04 The desert bandicoot was one of those.

05:06 And so it's just shocking to think that there's a whole series of these mammals that were

05:10 just widespread across outback Australia.

05:13 You go to Uluru, big national park, the habitat is still there.

05:18 Most of the mammals that were found in that cave are gone.

05:21 It's something like more than half the mammals are missing from Uluru, one of the most iconic

05:27 national parks in our country.

05:29 So yeah, it's extinction crisis.

05:31 In this case, it's cats and foxes.

05:33 And so those three animals we've just mentioned, Tim, they're extinct in the wild.

05:38 Are there any of them left in captivity?

05:40 No, no.

05:41 So I mentioned the two Christmas Island lizards which are in captivity.

05:46 All the ones I've mentioned, they are totally, totally, totally gone.

05:51 Such a sad story.

05:52 Yeah, no.

05:53 And people don't know about it.

05:55 So what should people and governments be doing to try to ensure we don't lose more?

06:02 Well, I mean, there are quite serious efforts to find some way of dealing with cats.

06:09 It's very difficult to stop cats hunting.

06:12 So certainly supporting those efforts.

06:14 I mean, people are putting up more fenced reserves.

06:16 So some of this work is certainly happening.

06:18 But I mean, if you look at a disease that got in in 2010, myrtle rust, I mean, this

06:24 is plants are just disappearing out of our rainforests.

06:27 I mean, there's a native guava, there's almost none left in the wild.

06:32 They've all just died.

06:33 I saw one in a park near me.

06:35 Actually, that was another species of tree, another species of rainforest tree that just

06:40 died in a couple of years.

06:41 So there's much more work that should be done in collecting these endangered plants.

06:47 And then the other part, the other answer to your question is once again, biosecurity

06:51 is looking at what are the diseases and pests out there that we most fear?

06:56 What are the pathways by which they could enter into Australia?

07:00 Is the Agriculture Department in terms of its border biosecurity doing everything it

07:05 should be to stop them getting in?

07:07 And we know the answer to that.

07:09 They are not because they've got this really strong focus on a small number of agricultural

07:14 pests.

07:15 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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