@vignouse@30pics4jackiesdiamond very good question.
This sapling will take many months to recover. Eucalypts do not grow back fast.
I talk about this a lot with other landowners who complain that "they planted trees and the koalas ate them and killed them". My first question is always "how many did you plant?".
Very often the answer is anything from 20 - 100.
This is when I nod my head and say, ah I see, do you think you could maybe plant again and this time put in 500 or 1000?
Sadly this is rarely met with an eager response.
So the reason for me saying this is - I have planted around 1000 trees here over the past 8 years, but the secret to the success is in this image, which is one of the roughly 3000 saplings that have naturally regenerated. This means there are around 4000 trees here from hip high to around 15 or so metres.
The koalas occasionally get too enthusiastic and kill a young tree, but it doesn't matter as that is part of the koala's place in the ecosystem.
So some trees recover, some don't and that's life :)
Their habitat is so degraded now that if someone plants a small amount of trees (less than hundreds), there is a high chance that after 2 - 3 years the koalas will over graze and kill them as they are starving out there.
This tree is highly likely to survive, and this actually forces the tree to grow more slowly as it recovers :)
@fbailey almost exclusively eucalypt but only a very small number of species. There are hundreds of eucs but koalas have 3 that are their primary trees, and then a couple of dozen that are secondaries, and a few them are not eucalyptus like a paperbark and a casuarina.
This means we only find koalas in certain types of eucalypt forests, not just any aussie bush. They are only ever found along the east coast of Australia.
This sapling is one of the primary koala food trees - the forest red gum.
@koalagardens Thanks for that, I didn't realise their diet was quite so restricted. Have you a lot of forest red gums? Sorry, question answered as I've just read your response to Richard and Jackie above.
@fbailey the really exciting thing was when the forest reds started to naturally regenerate and I realised what a transformation was possible. around 80% I think of the trees here are forest reds, except for the rainforest pocket.
so lots of koala food, but also a good biodiversity range too :)
Thanks for all the information. Love this photo of Krissy eating. It looks like Krissy is eating each leaf. We have white tailed deer. They rip off whole branches, eat a couple of leaves and some bark and just waste the rest. They aren’t endangered.
Hmm, what does an eartag on the left indicate? Or does he have a matching one on the right? I can never remember the etiquette of ear tags:) gorgeous as usual.
@pusspup Krissy developed chlamydial conjunctivitis when he was just turning 1 year (Nov last year) and I had to grab him and take him into the koala care centre where I volunteer, and we treated him successfully.
On release, by law, all koalas have to be tagged (and we now microchip them as well).
The importance of the tag being in the left ear is that it tells me straight away that he is a he, as males are tagged in the left ear, females in the right ear.
Now the bad pun ... the reason for this is because 'girls are always right'.
This sapling will take many months to recover. Eucalypts do not grow back fast.
I talk about this a lot with other landowners who complain that "they planted trees and the koalas ate them and killed them". My first question is always "how many did you plant?".
Very often the answer is anything from 20 - 100.
This is when I nod my head and say, ah I see, do you think you could maybe plant again and this time put in 500 or 1000?
Sadly this is rarely met with an eager response.
So the reason for me saying this is - I have planted around 1000 trees here over the past 8 years, but the secret to the success is in this image, which is one of the roughly 3000 saplings that have naturally regenerated. This means there are around 4000 trees here from hip high to around 15 or so metres.
The koalas occasionally get too enthusiastic and kill a young tree, but it doesn't matter as that is part of the koala's place in the ecosystem.
So some trees recover, some don't and that's life :)
Their habitat is so degraded now that if someone plants a small amount of trees (less than hundreds), there is a high chance that after 2 - 3 years the koalas will over graze and kill them as they are starving out there.
This tree is highly likely to survive, and this actually forces the tree to grow more slowly as it recovers :)
This means we only find koalas in certain types of eucalypt forests, not just any aussie bush. They are only ever found along the east coast of Australia.
This sapling is one of the primary koala food trees - the forest red gum.
so lots of koala food, but also a good biodiversity range too :)
On release, by law, all koalas have to be tagged (and we now microchip them as well).
The importance of the tag being in the left ear is that it tells me straight away that he is a he, as males are tagged in the left ear, females in the right ear.
Now the bad pun ... the reason for this is because 'girls are always right'.