Tasmanian devils reintroduced into Australia's mainland for 1st time in 3,000 years

Source: ABC News | October 7, 2020 | Julia Jacobo

A contagious cancer wiped out about 90% of the marsupials in recent years.

The Tasmanian devil, the feisty marsupial that only resided on the island of Tasmania for the last 3,000 years, has been reintroduced into Australia’s mainland for the first time in 3,000 years.

On Monday, 11 devils, along with six other species of small mammals, were released into a large preserve, where they’ll be able to roam free, forage for their own food and act as they would in the wild.

The feat is a result of a decade-long project by Aussie Ark, an animal preservation organization that created an “insurance population” for the species, which is listed as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List.

The release was welcome news after billions of animals were lost in the bush fires that began in late 2019 and have continued into 2020.

“Australia has just been wiped out,” Shute said. “We have the worst mammal extinction rate in the world.”

PHOTO: A Tasmanian devil stands in a wooded area in an undated photo.
Arterra/Universal Images Group via Getty Images, FILE
A Tasmanian devil stands in a wooded area in an undated photo.

The devils existed on mainland Australia for 40,000 years, until around the time the Dingo, a medium-sized wild dog, was introduced on the continent, according to Australian Geographic. It has been widely accepted that the Dingo wiped out the devils, but a study published in the journal Ecology in 2013 challenged that assumption, suggesting that the arrival of Aboriginal populations and a shift in climate are really to blame.

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