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General News

20 October, 2023

Have you spotted a koala?

A NEW koala-tracking map has been launched over the weekend, allowing the public to report koala sightings in their community.

By wd-news

A NEW koala-tracking map has been launched over the weekend, allowing the public to report koala sightings in their community.

Mosswood Wildlife launched the map on Saturday, enabling the collection of data on the koala population of southwest Victoria.

Manager Tracey Wilson said the data collected using the map can be used as evidence for authorities to show koala hotspots.

“It gives us an idea of where, for instance, we get a lot of deaths,” she said.

“This is why we ask people to also report dead koalas on the road; it’s all very well to petition a council or an authority to say ‘hey, so something about our koalas; they’re getting squashed on the roads’, but people always ask for figures.

“It also gives the opportunity for the public to be involved; a lot of people don’t realise that koalas are quite common in the overall area and the landscape in the area, so it gives them the opportunity to become involve din that sort of thing.”

A koala sighting can be marked on the map by dropping a ‘pin’ at the sighting location.

Ms Wilson used the recent sighting of the koala which had been reported by the Camperdown Chronicle, named ‘Kev’ by residents, as an example of the features of the map.

“For instance, Kev would go on the map,” she said.

“People can put in comments; the next door neighbour might have seen Kev too, but if they know it’s Kev, in the comments section there’s the opportunity to say ‘this is Kev; he’s the local koala in this area, also sighted at these areas’.

“Or you can simply load up a photo of Kev and make the comment or drop a pin at the address.”

Ms Wilson said she aims to engage people with the interactive map.

“We get lots and lots of calls all across the southwest of Victoria for koalas in trouble,” she said.

“It will give us some indications of where we can campaign for green corridors; if there’s an area where lots of animals are getting run over, then you look at approaching VicRoads for signage saying, ‘please slow down animals crossing’.

“We are really hoping that, after it’s been running for a couple of months, that we start to collect really significant data and we’ll get a true idea of how many animals are in the landscape.”
The map can be accessed by visiting mosswoodwildlife.org.au/koala-spotting-map/

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