As Australian bushfire relief efforts continue to benefit from international news coverage, charity and governmental organizations are joining forces to help displaced wildlife survive a new crisis: food scarcity.
Airplanes and helicopters are being used to drop food from the air to feed the starving marsupials that have thus far survived the 2019–2020 bushfire crisis. Survivors are not yet out of danger; rather, they are at serious risk of dying from their injuries or from starvation.
“Operation Rock Wallaby” hopes to dramatically alter the outlook for these animals for the better.
“The wallabies typically survive the fire itself, but are then left stranded with limited natural food as the fire takes out the vegetation around their rocky habitat,” explained New South Wales Environment Minister Matt Kean, as per the Daily Mail.
“The wallabies were already under stress from the ongoing drought,” Kean continued, “making survival challenging for the wallabies without assistance.”
The ambitious food-drop operation started as a collaboration between the Wildlife Service, New South Wales National Parks, and NSW government officials. The group chartered aircraft in order to drop thousands of kilograms of sweet potatoes and carrots on the ground for the program’s target species: small-eared, brush-tailed rock wallabies.
The rock wallaby was already an at-risk species before the bushfires began, owing to vast habitat destruction. Photos of the food drop and of the hungry marsupials feasting on fresh carrots and potatoes are fast going viral.
ABC North Queensland shared snaps of the feasting wallabies on Facebook, captioned: “Anyone order thousands of kilograms of carrots and sweet potato?” The news channel also clarified that the food drops would be accompanied by “intensive feral predator control.”
Kean later added that cameras would be strategically placed to monitor the uptake of the food and the recovery process of the region’s rock wallaby population.
According to Australia’s Department of Environment and Energy, brush-tailed rock wallabies live on “rocky escarpments, granite outcrops, and cliffs.” There are 15 different species of the wallaby. Since the bushfires began in September 2019, most of the sparse populations of brush-tailed rock wallabies have but been wiped out; the marsupial is now considered threatened.
“Australian biodiversity has been going down over the last several decades, and it’s probably fairly well known that Australia’s got the world’s highest rate of extinction for mammals,” University of Sydney ecologist Chris Dickman told KOSU radio’s “The World“ program.
“It’s events like this that may well hasten the extinction process for a range of other species,” Dickman continued. “So, it’s a very sad time.”
As of Jan. 12, 2020, nearly 2,000 pounds (approx. 907 kg) of sweet potatoes and carrots have been delivered to NSW’s Capertee and Wolgan Valleys. As per ABC News, an additional 2,000 pounds have been sent to Yengo National Park, and 200 pounds (approx. 91 kg) of food and water have been delivered to Kangaroo Valley to help keep this threatened species alive.
“At this stage, we expect to continue providing supplementary food to rock wallaby populations until sufficient natural food resources and water become available again,” Kean said in a statement for the NSW government website.
The charity Animals Australia has also been using aircraft to transport and deliver grain, pellets, and veterinary supplies for the injured and starving wildlife of regional Victoria.
“With roads likely shut for weeks, the risk of starvation for surviving wildlife in the area is very real,” said Animals Australia spokeswoman Lyn White, as per the Daily Mail.
“It would be tragic if there was a further loss of life because the needs of surviving animals [were] not being met,” she added.
In terms of direct impact, January’s airborne relief efforts are helping support Australia’s surviving wildlife at this crucial juncture in an immediate and meaningful way.
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