Aerial Food Drops Feed Endangered Wildlife Affected by Australia Fires

A Brush-tailed rock-wallaby munches on snacks from the NSW Government (via NPWS/DPIE)

It’s raining carrots and sweet potatoes in New South Wales.

Aerial food drops to endangered Brush-tailed Rock-wallabies in fire-affected areas of Australia are part of the NSW government’s wildlife recovery effort.

“The provision of supplementary food is one of the key strategies we are deploying to promote the survival and recovery of endangered species like the Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby,” Environment Minister Matt Kean said in statement.

Several “important” populations’ natural habitat and vegetation were gutted in the country’s recent bushfires, sparked by record-breaking temperatures and months of severe drought.

“The wallabies were already under stress from the ongoing drought, making survival challenging … without assistance,” according to Kean.

In the last week, more than 2,200 pounds of sweet potato and carrot have been distributed to six colonies in the Capertee and Wolgan valleys and five sites in Yengo National Park; another 200 pounds of food and water were delivered in the Kangaroo Valley.

Similar drops have taken place in the Jenolan, Oxley Wild Rivers, and Curracubundi national parks.

Operation Rock Wallaby 🦘- #NPWS staff today dropped thousands of kgs of food (Mostly sweet potato and carrots) for our Brush-tailed Rock-wallaby colonies across NSW 🥕🥕 #bushfires pic.twitter.com/ZBN0MSLZei

— Matt Kean MP (@Matt_KeanMP) January 11, 2020

This marks the NSW government’s largest-ever food drop for Brush-tailed Rock-wallabies, marked “vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List; officials hope their efforts will maintain these colonies and allow the critters to recover.

For the foreseeable future, the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment will continue providing sustenance to the marsupials—”until sufficient natural food resources and water become available again in the landscape,” Kean said.

Catering services will be accompanied by intensive feral predator control, as required.

“When we can, we are also setting up cameras to monitor the uptake of the food and the number and variety of animals there” Kean added.

It’s hard to imagine the scope of the Australian wildfires.

You can start to understand, though, through images shared by European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano.

An immense ash cloud covers Australia as we fly toward the sunset.

Una immensa nube di cenere copre l’Australia mentre voliamo verso il tramonto.#MissionBeyond pic.twitter.com/9Bmm9s4xa1

— Luca Parmitano (@astro_luca) January 13, 2020

“Talking to my crew mates, we realized that none of us had ever seen fires at such terrifying scale,” he wrote of the “immense ash cloud,” as seen from the International Space Station.

More on Geek.com:

• NASA Satellites Animate World Path of Smoke From Australia Bushfires
• How to Help Victims of the Australian Bushfires
• Endangered Mountain Gorilla Population on the Rise

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