For the first time in more than 100 years, Eastern Bettongs are to return to NSW with the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) unveiling a plan reintroduce the species in the coming weeks.
Celebrating the achievement, Minister for Environment, James Griffin said the species’ return was thanks to NPWS partnerships with the ACT Parks and Conservation Service, the Australian National University and others.
Mr Griffin said the Eastern Bettongs, small marsupials from the kangaroo family, would be reintroduced to Yiraaldiya National Park, Sydney’s first 555-hectare feral predator-free national park.
“The last eastern bettong disappeared from mainland Australia in the 1920s, surviving only in Tasmania, and this upcoming release will mean we’ve returned 11 species that were once extinct in New south Wales back into our national parks – a globally significant outcome,” Mr Griffin said.
“The reintroduction of these first six marsupials is part of our ambitious program to rewild ecosystems across New South Wales and give the community a sense of what our natural environment can be like when restored to its former glory.”
He said Eastern Bettongs were known as ‘ecosystem engineers’, “playing a critical role in the ecosystem to dig and aerate soil in their search for food, create niches for moisture, spores and seed, helping return bushland to what it used to be”.
Mr Griffin said the pioneering group of Bettongs would be translocated from the ACT’s Mulligans Flat Woodland Sanctuary, where they were reintroduced more than 10 years ago.
ACT Minister for the Environment, Rebecca Vassarotti said cross-jurisdictional partnerships were critical for conserving Australia’s threatened species.
“Mulligans Sanctuary has been a great success and it’s fantastic to see our animals now being translocated to support the population expansion elsewhere,” Ms Vassarotti said.
