Protecting our Wildlife

It’s important to think about our native wildlife during natural disasters and extreme temperature changes. The drought-like conditions across the Gympie region have put many of our wildlife under stress.

Here are some things you can do to help:

Create habitats for our wildlife

The right plants provide food and shelter for many animals. But why not go a step further and install habitat boxes for animals such as possums, birds, bats and gliders?

Talk with your local nursery for ideas. If your property is suitable, think about becoming a member of Gympie’s Land for Wildlife program (www.gympie.qld.gov.au/land-for-wildlife).

Protect our wildlife from injury or harm

Wildlife are prone to injury from cats, dogs, vehicles and entrapment from the infrastructure we install on our properties, such as fencing. Help keep them safe by keeping cats inside at night and keeping dogs secure in your yard and on a lead when outside your yard. Take notice of wildlife signage while driving, these denote wildlife hotspots, please slow down and watch out for wildlife.

If installing or repairing fencing or covering crops/fruit trees with netting on your property, consider the following Wildlife Friendly Fencing and Netting principles and call an experienced animal carer should you find wildlife entrapped or injured.

Be careful not to kill our wildlife with kindness

Please don’t feed bread to wildlife. And please don’t pour water straight into the mouths of native animals. This may cause their lungs to fill with water and they may drown. Instead leave water dishes out for them.

Protect our coastal and riverine animals

Please don’t drive on sand dunes or along river banks because these are where turtles nest. Please stop your dogs from disturbing the migratory birds found in Tin Can Bay and around Rainbow Beach.

This region is very fortunate to have connected habitat for our wildlife. This means it’s possible for the animals to move safely throughout our region.

The region has high numbers of koalas and is home to many rare and threatened species. It is more important than ever to do what we can to protect these species and their habitat.

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