Female Koala killed | Mount Gravatt Environment Group

By: Michael Fox

Our mountain community is hurting after two Koala Mums and Joeys were hit on Mt Gravatt Outlook Drive in the last week.

The first was found early morning having been hit at night. Koala Mum, Angela, didn’t make it, she died leaving Joey Monty an orphan in care.

A couple of days later a second Mum, Myra, was hit on the road and taken to the Koala Hospital were she was discovered to be lactating.

Alerted, my neighbours, Miranda and Scott started the search for Myra’s joey. No success. so my neighbours returned to the search at night. A glimpse of eye shine alerted Miranda and the joey was located high in a tree beside the road.

Time to call in the rescue at height experts. A real community effort. High lift fire brigade bucket trucks arrived: Luna from Roma Street and Juliette from Wishart Station.

Yasha was wrapped up warm to help manage shock and taken to hospital.

The story has a happy ending … Yasha was reunited with Mum the next morning.

Unfortunately even though the speed limit on the mountain has been reduced to 40 kph there still too many incidents with koalas being hit by speeding cars and increasing reports of dangerous hooning on the road at night.

Community members are concerned that the gate is not being closed at night. Shutting the gate at night not only dramatically reduced hooning it also had a dramatic impact on the volume of rubbish collected at Clean Up Australia:

2011 – 55 bags of rubbish and recyclables collected
2014 – 29 bags
2017 – 21 bags
2018 – 19 bags
2019 – 10 bags

I am getting reports that the gate is not being closed at night at all which would explain the speeding cars at night and tragedies like the death of Monty’s Mum.

My understanding is that closing the gate is manged by contract staff. So does this mean we are not receiving the service Council pays for on our behalf? Local community member Vicky has committed to regularly monitoring the gate closure times.

You can help by calling the Council Call Centre on 07 3403 8888 to lodge a request for the gate to be closed at night.

By: Michael Fox

Sheamus O’Connor, Group Leader of Gertrude Petty Place Bushcare, reported on the Group’s first event for 2020 with sad news:

“Unfortunately, an injured koala was found about 50m down from GPP, up on the hill, sitting at the bottom of a tree. She had been bitten by a dog on her wrist and was very sick from infection. Angela, the local wildlife rescuer, collected her however has little hope in full recovery. Let’s hope she recovers.

We’ve got signs now but that is obviously not enough, people ignore them and continue to have their dogs off lead. What will it take for people to take responsibility for their pets?” Sheamus

As reported in the Southern Star this week the Koala Phascolarctos cinereus did not survive this dog attack.

It is very disappointing that irresponsible individuals still ignore the signs and let their dogs run loose in the Reserve.

Mt Gravatt Conservation Reserve is a special place with a wide diversity of flora and fauna including a healthy breeding population of Koalas appreciated by tourists, international students and even increasing property values in the area.

Dogs off-leash are also a problem for walkers with children or people walking their own dogs on-leash. For other people, even a well behaved dog off-leash creates uncertainty because they don’t know how that strange dog will behave around their children or their dog.

Unfortunately, we have reports that challenging walkers with dogs off-leash is often met with aggressive rudeness. So consider simply taking a photo, from a distance, and reporting to Brisbane City Council call centre on 07 3403 8888.

Dogs do love to run loose, so consider visiting the local Abbeville Street Park off-leash area or look for one of the other 150 City Council dog off-leash areas.