The federal government’s Atlas of Living Australia has more than 27,000 koala sighting reports, but with only 64 since the start of 2010, the Atlas, as it pertains to koalas, is an historic rather than living record.

This is in stark contrast to the data captured by our crowdsourced KoalaTracker database. Your reports of sightings and observations of behaviour are now critical to a body of research to-date untapped and more often treated with scepticism by researchers.

As government agencies start to realise the value in the observations of koalas in the wild by citizens, crowdsourcing of data across a broad spectrum of science (not limited to koalas) is destined to become part of public policy, and the norm.

You are leading the way.

In the more than two years since the launch of this website, it has become increasingly obvious that what we think we know about the koala is insufficient and in some cases patently wrong.

Reports from members of KoalaTracker.com.au prove koalas do drink water and not just in droughts. Koalas have been observed swimming (in the ocean) and living in family groups (with sometimes up to five koalas in a single tree). We have photos suggesting koalas eat flowers, and photos of wild koalas embracing human rescuers and proactively seeking human help, having never had human contact.

New Research

In February 2011, NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service confirmed that koalas eat bark. 

This discovery was first documented by citizens.  NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service reported in February 2011:

“Koala Scientist, Chris Allen, said today that using remote movement sensitive video and camera equipment in bushland southeast of Bredbo several Koalas were caught on camera.

“It was the owners of a nearby property who documented and reported widespread and extensive chewing of eucalypts and suggested that Koalas were responsible,” Mr Allen said.

“Although koalas are known to eat bark, there is no record of such systematic feeding on eucalypt bark recorded in the scientific literature and their reports were initially received with scepticism.

“We placed our cameras adjacent to heavily chewed trees and we now have some wonderful footage of Koalas, including some that are chewing into the trunk of the tree.

“We are very grateful to the owners of the neighbouring property who provided such detailed evidence and persisted with efforts to establish that it was the koala that was responsible.” See video.

This behaviour is considered to be unique to a population on the Monaro Tablelands south of Canberra, yet Port Macquarie Koala Hospital also has evidence of koalas eating bark. Port Macquarie is a long way from south of Canberra…it is a different tree... 

Do your trees have odd markings?  What have you seen koalas do that may not be widely known? Report those sightings and describe the activity on KoalaTracker.com.au today! 

Over the coming years, I am anticipating behavioural research that will prove an intelligence and capacity for communication that will dispel the myth of a sleepy, solitary, and unadaptable animal.

Much of that new research will come from you, the citizen scientists (including rescuers and carers) who encounter and observe koalas in the urban wild, and report those observations to KoalaTracker.com.au.

Already, KoalaTracker is invaluable to conservation advocacy, with its map proving indispensable to community groups fighting to protect tracts of land, re-establish wildlife corridors, and change public policy for more effective risk mitigation, and to councils and utilities in urban and infrastructure planning. 

What value KoalaTracker can be in the future depends entirely upon the quality and quantity of data that continues to be added as time goes by.  We need significantly more data from NSW, VIC, central and northern QLD.  There is no room for complacency.  Please encourage your local rescue groups and carers to join and report their sightings directly to KoalaTracker.com.au.  Given the now regular use of KoalaTracker.com.au by environmental consultants, council staff, utilities, developers and state government departments, YOUR information is critical to protecting what koalas we have left.  Please do not put this aside. Do something today.

You are a part of the solution. Report every sighting, every death and injury. Tell your friends to do the same.