- Title
- Health Assessments of Koalas after Wildfire: A Temporal Comparison of Rehabilitated and Non-Rescued Resident Individuals
- Creator
- Lane, Murraya R.; Lowe, Arianne; Vukcevic, Jelena; Clark, Robert G.; Madani, George; Higgins, Damien P.; Silver, Luke; Belov, Katherine; Hogg, Carolyn J.; Marsh, Karen J.
- Relation
- Animals Vol. 13, Issue 18, no. 2863
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ani13182863
- Publisher
- Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI)
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2023
- Description
- Many koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) required rehabilitation after the 2019/20 Australian megafires. Little is known about how the post-release health of rehabilitated koalas compares to non-rescued resident koalas. We evaluated health parameters in rehabilitated koalas and resident koalas in burnt and unburnt habitat in southern New South Wales, Australia. Health checks were undertaken within six weeks of fire (rehabilitated group), 5-9 months post-fire and 12-16 months post-fire. Body condition improved significantly over time in rehabilitated koalas, with similar condition between all groups at 12-16 months. Rehabilitated koalas therefore gained body condition at similar rates to koalas who remained and survived in the wild. The prevalence of Chlamydia pecorum was also similar between groups and timepoints, suggesting wildfire and rehabilitation did not exacerbate disease in this population. While there was some variation in measured serum biochemistry and haematology parameters between groups and timepoints, most were within normal reference ranges. Our findings show that koalas were generally healthy at the time of release and when recaptured nine months later. Landscapes in the Monaro region exhibiting a mosaic of burn severity can support koalas, and rehabilitated koala health is not compromised by returning them to burnt habitats 4-6 months post-fire.
- Subject
- marsupial folivore; bushfires; health parameters; rehabilitation; body condition
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1495109
- Identifier
- uon:53969
- Identifier
- ISSN:2076-2615
- Rights
- © 2023 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
- Language
- eng
- Full Text
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