Welcome to 101 Koala Road, Victoria’s newest home for koalas and other wildlife. Here, with your help, Koala Clancy Foundation will plant thousands of trees to restore native habitat.
Once, there would have been at least 101 koalas living in the Barrabool Hills around Gnarwarre, west of Geelong. Now there’s only a handful. Nearby the beautiful Barwon River longs for koalas to doze in its ancient Red Gums, eat their leaves, and sing through the summer nights. But she needs more of those Red Gums before koalas will return.
The once diverse ecosystems in these areas were removed for farming and agriculture because of the high quality soil. This drove koalas like our beloved Clancy, Kiki, and Winberry out of their homes and into low-quality, isolated habitats. As a result, we’ve watched koala populations decline all over Victoria: the You Yangs koala population has experienced a 50% decline in 10 years.
If their population continues to decline at the same rate, they will be locally extinct within the next decade.
We won’t let this happen, though. We know what koalas need, we know what trees to plant and we know how. In just 3 months of 2022 we planted 27,000+ koala trees.
Rural landowners are taking action by reaching out to us to transform their land into native wildlife habitat to give koalas a fighting chance in the face of climate change. Thanks to the generous plot of land that we’re working with for this project, Gnarwarre will be home to another huge space of river-side koala habitat – prime real estate for our furry friends!
The current river forest is only one tree wide, and just too narrow for koalas to live. But we will plant a huge 270 – 380m wide new forest, which will create a node of quality habitat, protected from edge effects, and safe for many species to thrive.
This project won’t just benefit koalas. Many other species such as the Little Eagle, Rainbow Bee-eater, Swamp Wallaby, Echidna will be able to roam freely in the area – scavenging, nesting, breeding, and enjoying the rich, pristine habitat. Sunrise birdsongs will return to the area, and the call of the koala will be heard once again.
This project has the potential to begin the return of koalas to the area and live up to its name: 101 Koala Road, but we need your support – it won’t be possible without your donations.
We have set a $20,000 community fundraising target for this project. If you’ve ever wondered what you can do to support Australia’s beloved wildlife icon, this is your answer.
A donation to Koala Clancy Foundation is a donation to the future for koalas. It’s a tree in the ground – a tree that will make up a forest, that will make up a home for wildlife.
Every $10 plants 1 tree – donate today.
