CONCERN FOR WILD LIFE

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31000, 4 March 1966, Page 13

CONCERN FOR WILD LIFE

(Special Crspdt. N.Z.P.A.)

SYDNEY, March 3.

The Victorian Government’s decision this week to lift the 8s bounty on every wombat’s scalp has highlighted the increasing concern in the country over the survival of Australia’s unique wildlife. In recent years Australians have managed to give the impression that, in the words of

one American naturalist, they are “engaged in an all-out war on everything finned, furred and feathered that moves.” The Duke of Edinburgh first brought the matter to public notice in 1963 when he warned Australians that their famous emblem, the kangaroo, could become extinct if their widespread slaughter went unchecked.

That things have improved little in three years was underlined by his son. Prince Charles, who said plaintively when he arrived in Sydney recently: “I would like very much to see a kangaroo in its native state.”

The operative words here were “in its native state,” for if the Prince succeeds in this wish, he will have achieved something that very few Australians have. One authority estimates that not one Australian in 10 has seen a single kangaroo, or its co-partner on the country’s coat of arms, the emu, outside the confines of a zoo.

Australian has a unique selection of animals, which have captured world-wide interest, but little, if anything, has

been done by way of setting aside sanctuaries and protecting them. The Koala bear, the lyrebird and the duck-billed platypus are protected, but the kangaroo, the emu, the wombat, the wedge-tailed eagle and the Cape Barren goose are still hunted and killed wantonly. Victoria’s bounty on the wombat was imposed after heavy pressure from farmers, who claimed that it broke through fences and attacked the roots of some plants. But it led to about 8000 wombats being shot or trapped in the State each year—many far from any farm —and there has been an increasing campaign recently to give the little creatures a respite. In lifting the bounty for a trial period of three years, the State Government' intends to continue investigating re-

ports of damage to farms by wombats, and to fumigate areas where they cause trouble.

Recent surveys of masupials in two States in Australia produced some figures which alarmed naturalists. In the south-west comer of Western Australia, once inhabited by 39 species of marsupials and rodents, 11 were found to have been missing for many years and are probably extinct, five have not been sighted for some time and only 15 were surviving. In New South Wales, 22 of a known 52 species of marsupials were found to be extinct or rare.

The concern over this situation is obvious when it is known that Australia has only about 120 marsupial species.