When researchers attempted to reintroduce vulnerable parma wallabies to bushland in NSW's Illawarra region, it didn't end well for the adorable little marsupials.
Three months after their release, all 48 wallabies were dead - the majority killed by foxes - highlighting the need for urgent action to ensure the species' survival, says ANU environmental expert George Wilson.
Professor Wilson urged the government to create more fox-free safe havens in a research paper published in Australian Zoologist on Saturday.
"We know that parma wallabies are thriving in a predator-free enclosure at Mount Wilson," he said.
"We need to create more private sector safe havens and captive breeding programs like that one to secure these animals’ long-term survival."
Parma wallabies were believed to have gone extinct until a thriving population was found on New Zealand's Kawau Island in 1965.
Fortunately, Sir George Grey - a governor of South Australia and then New Zealand - had populated the island with exotic animals, including parma wallabies, in the 1860s.
There, in the absence of foxes, the wallabies thrived, growing so numerous their bulging population needed to be culled.
But despite various reintroduction efforts, their status in Australia remains perilous - especially after populations were decimated in the 2019/20 Black Summer bushfires.
The NSW government is building another predator-free enclosure at Ngambaa Nature Reserve which it hopes will house parma wallabies relocated from Mount Wilson.
But Prof Wilson argues more facilities are needed and the highly specified predator-proof fencing is too costly for the government to sustain on its own.
"Government agencies should be working with private landholders to build them in a cost-effective manner and encourage greater collaboration between zoos, nature reserves and commercial investors," he said.
NSW’s Saving Our Species program was more aspirational than realistic given current government resources, said report co-author Samaa Kalsia, a species-management expert at Australian Wildlife Services.
"Historically, there hasn’t been much research conducted that focuses on parma wallabies, and this is further contributing to the species’ elevated risk of extinction," she said.
Governments needed to provide incentives for private landowners to facilitate rather than inhibit the creation of more sanctuaries like the one at Mount Wilson, Ms Kalsia said.
