Transcriber: H Maria Castro Reviewer: Dawn Theresa Suffling
(Applause)
What do you know about koalas?
A couple of key facts, maybe?
Here's what I knew about koalas in 2008.
They sleep a lot.
They eat gum leaves.
They don't drink.
And there are lots in Adelaide.
So when, in February 2009, I saw these photographs of koalas drinking water,
lots of photographs of koalas drinking water,
I realised I knew nothing at all about koalas.
So I began asking everyone I could what did they know about koalas.
They knew stuff all too.
The number of koalas left has been guessed to be
somewhere between 40 thousand and 100 thousand.
Now that's a heck of a range.
But what if it's much less than that?
What else do we think we know, but we don't?
What else do we need to know?
A lot, apparently, because a threatened species scientific committee
assessed and rejected listing the koala as endangered
in 1996, 2006 and again in 2012.
And the reason it gave was, and I quote,
"The body of data on koala populations is patchy, often sparse
and not nationally comprehensive or coordinated." End of quote.
Good public policy, the experts argue, is founded on empirical evidence
and here, they were claiming, there was none.
Watching a koala cross the road in front of me in one of my early morning walks
to the national park around July 2009,
I realised that in reality, we, the ordinary citizens,
were the ones best placed to make the observations
on the scale that was required.
We had to answer three questions. How many koalas are left?
Where do they live? And in what condition?
These questions are fundamental
to our ability to save the koala, but nobody knew.
And with community engagement and koala conservation being the missing link,
the idea for Koala Tracker was born.
It is Australia's national koala map.
Self-funded, it cost me 10 thousand dollars in direct expenses to set up,
18 hundred hours of work to date and counting,
and 70 dollars a month to keep it on air.
But, in just four years, we have amassed a body of proof of koala colony locations
that is increasingly difficult to ignore and, most significantly,
in areas deemed to be free of, or not suitable, for koalas.
You see, the focus for 20 years of koala conservation policy
has been trees, habitat, as assessed by pixel colour from satellite maps.
This is a snapshot of the Queensland Government's
official koala habitat map for an area of the Sunshine Coast between
Cooroy and Eumundi, west of the highway, called Eerwah Vale.
According to the habitat values assessment,
it is of low value, or not suitable habitat for koalas,
as evidenced by the cream, brown and pale green shading.
Incidentally, the area under Lake Weyba to the east,
and from Peregian north to the Sunshine Beach, and most of Noosa
is designated low value or not a suitable habitat for koalas.
What's important about this is that significant infrastructure projects,
development approvals, planning decisions, use this map.
And those habitat values have absolutely no relationship
with the actual location of koalas.
This is what Koala Tracker shows for the same area.
Each of those markers, green for live,
yellow for sick or injured and red for dead,
are our mapped koala sightings.
They prove Eerwah Vale to be rare on the Sunshine Coast
for its healthy, undisturbed koala population.
But in 2010, high-voltage power lines were planned for this area.
That would have required the clearing of 65-metres wide for several kilometres
with multiple access tracks of 8-metres wide.
It would have decimated this koala colony.
But with the evidence on Koala Tracker,
I was able to make a submission
in support of the residents of the Eerwah Vale
to the State Government and power generator,
specific to this koala population,
of which the government and Powerlink were previously unaware.
Now while this project was thankfully shelved.
Development across the state, across the country, continues unabated
and in ignorance of existing, unmapped koala populations.
Development that will see land-clearing for housing accelerate.
Development that will see the creation of roads that fragment habitat
and the introduction of wood wool housing and exotic shrubs,
that create further distance for the koala to cover between food trees.
This puts them on the ground for extended periods of time,
where they battle cars and dogs.
And those are battles the koala never wins.
And did you know koalas cry?
When they are distressed from injury,
the loss of their home tree, or mother, or dog attack,
as is the case for this koala, who has just lost an ear to a dog,
they sit in a tight ball, on the ground, and weep.
Cut down its home tree and the koala will continue to return to the site,
hoping the tree will reappear.
What Koala Tracker shows is that disease is not the biggest killer of koalas.
We are. Because koalas don't live out there
in some aether between cities and farms, coast and mountains.
They don't move out of the neighbourhood as we bring the bulldozers in,
they don't have satellite maps telling there's better habitat 50 km away.
They continue to live and die among us.
Because of us.
But now we are crowdsourcing the location,
points of impact and causes of death and injury for the public record,
on a single national database,
that is freely accessible to governments,
researchers, community groups, schools and individuals,
which gives us the tools and the power to make space for koalas.
We are helping communities deliver to the government the evidence they need
to change the path of power lines and roads.
We are providing the necessary evidence to preserve significant
old-growth koala food forests, such as Beerburrum and Brisbane.
We have trained members to recognise signs of illness, from wet brown bottoms
through infected eyes, triggering an immediate call for rescue
to any one of the number of emergency numbers on our website.
And we are revealing information new to science.
With reports and photographs of koalas eating termites and bark,
of koalas eating the leaves of camphor laurel, macadamia,
malaleuka, olive and pear trees.
More importantly, we are generating community awareness and education
that is leading to localised conservation
that could just possibly be the saving of the koala.
If we look at that habitat map for Brisbane and surrounds,
remember cream, brown and pale green shading
designate low or no-value habitat,
the contrast between this and Koala Tracker is pretty stark.
Again, our markers, green for live, yellow for sick or injured
and red for dead are individual sighting reports manually entered
by members of Koala Tracker.
In graphic fashion, they redefine koala habitat from a bunch of pixels
as seen from space to an area inhabited by koalas.
And because we show the points of impact and causes of death and injury,
we also show where to put exclusion fencing and highway crossings,
where do we need to do further research on the ground,
and where not to put massive new housing estates and infrastructure.
We have removed so much old-growth forest already,
we need to preserve the remaining pockets of urban forest,
of remnant and regrowth forest on public and private lands
and we need to connect these to provide safe corridors
for breeding and dispersal and the improved genetic health of koalas.
Crowdsourcing the location and points of impact,
deaths and injuries of koalas is fundamentally important.
Because where you have habitat map stating specific areas are not habitat
or low-value habitat, they do not receive the same protection as other areas
mapped by pixel colours as being of high value.
But it is this that enables effective and proactive risk mitigation.
So, if you have ever wondered what you can do to save the koala,
here it is: join Australia's national koala mapping project.
koalatracker.com.au
and report every koala you see in the wild, alive, dead, sick or injured
and you too, can become the wildlife and spatial citizen scientist
the koala needs you to be.
A sight import takes less than 3 minutes.
You can search the database on town or suburb, date range,
cause of death or injury, or keyword.
You can zoom in on the map to analise clusters of disease deaths, road kills,
potential corridors and so much more.
And through this large-scale collaborative effort,
we are saving governments at every level millions of dollars on surveys.
You, we, are the best damned spatial and wildlife scientists no money can buy.
And with every new member to Koala Tracker,
we are raising the political stakes in favour of the koala.
The contribution that Koala Tracker is making
to our understanding of the koala
is exciting in terms of conservation and urban planning
and the community involvement in that.
But it is a travesty that the lack of such a database or map has been the cause
of the koala not being listed as endangered,
threatened or even vulnerable sooner.
We won't let that happen again, will we?
(Applause)
Thank you, Alex.
(Applause)