DEAR News Of The Area,

HAVING coffee with a new friend, I was intrigued to hear her story of her first job.

Trained as a wildlife officer, she was employed about 30 years ago at a tourist attraction in QLD, Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary.

Her job was to train baby koalas to ride on the backs of Alsatian dogs!

The baby koalas would be screaming in terror, until with constant repetition, ‘the spirit was gone from them’ and they complied.

This was the big tourist draw card!

We look back now and view such acts as inhumane and cruel.

Koala hugging (holding them) has only recently been banned at Lone Pine, as it is acknowledged as being too stressful for the koalas.

To think back of the eight million koalas shot for their lucrative pelts from 1888 to 1920, reminds us that this was their land.

They were very widespread and lived here in peace until then.

What will future generations think of our complacency at destroying the last chance for the survival of the koala, by continuously logging their much-needed Great Koala Park.

Knowing fragmenting the remnant populations will be their death knell, as all the science tells us they need connective corridors for bigger gene pools and options during climate change for them to survive.

Let the Minns Government know they need to keep their promises.

Can you imagine Australia without koalas?

Regards,
Louise CRANNY,
Bellingen.