Martin, from Geckoes Wildlife, has spent many years working as a park ranger and a wildlife curator and was keen to share his wildlife experiences with the attendees at this month’s workshop.
Geckoes Wildlife Program supports the conservation of rare, threatened and endangered species, and aims to create a better understanding between people and wildlife.
It was an engaging workshop where we were able to get up close with a variety of amazing local wildlife. Martin shared stories about how the animals came to be in his care, such as a tawny frogmouth which was from the old Big Pineapple Tourist Park and in need of a new home, and the Mary River Turtle which had met people like Peter Garrett when it was taken to Canberra during the Mary River Dam protests. Other animals found a home with Martin after they had been taken to wildlife rescue organisations with injuries and were not able to be released back into the wild.
As Martin introduced us to each animal he talked about their distinguishing features, adaptations and survival mechanisms. We learned that the fat-tailed dunnart stores fat in its tail for when food is in short supply, that bandicoots have the shortest gestation period of any marsupial and that SE Queensland has the most snake species of any settled area in the world.
Martin discussed some of the threats to our local wildlife such as land clearing, habitat interference and predation by domestic and introduced animals. The frill necked lizard has almost disappeared from SE Qld because of habitat destruction and the Mary River turtle is now critically endangered due to nest predation by foxes and wild dogs and predation of the juvenile turtles by fork-tailed catfish which thrived after tidal barrages were built on the Mary River.
The photos show how much everyone enjoyed Martin’s presentation and the appeal of the animals for which he advocates.
Vanessa Presling
