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Ecologist 'bursts into tears' seeing endangered gliders using replacement nests

No one knew if this idea would actually work.

Photo credit: Canva

An image of a great glider

When a team of Australian researchers started checking the high-tech boxes they'd installed to help save endangered greater gliders back in 2023, they weren't sure what they were going to find. The hope was that the tree-dwelling marsupials would use them for nesting—a replacement for the tree hollows they normally nest in—but no one knew whether or not the creatures would take to them.

So when Dr. Kita Ashman, Threatened Species and Climate Adaptation Ecologist at WWF-Australia, found a glider in the second box she checked, she was thrilled.

"I just burst into tears, I was so surprised and so happy," she told ABC News Australia.

Greater gliders are nocturnal marsupials that live in old-growth forests of eastern Australia. They have large ears, fluffy fur, long tails, and they can glide up to 100 meters at a time. The species is only found in Australia.

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"I grew up looking at greater gliders all throughout the Dandenong Ranges. So they have a really special place in my heart," said Dr. Ashman told ANU.

The special nesting boxes were designed and created through a partnership between Australian National University (ANU), Greening Australia and the World Wide Fund for Nature-Australia after 2019-2020 bushfires destroyed a third of the greater gliders' remaining habitat. The tree hollows that greater gliders rely on to nest can take over 100 years to form, according to ANU, so it's not like they can just find some new trees to live in when their homes are destroyed.

Nesting boxes that are commonly used for wildlife aren't a good fit for greater gliders, as the thin walls and lack of thermal protection can result in gliders overheating. (Heat-stressed gliders will slow their eating, which can be life-threatening, according to ANU.) The high-tech boxes in this project are insulated and include a non-toxic, heat-reflective, fire-resistant coating to keep gliders safe.

"I've affectionately been calling this design the Goldilocks box because we hope it will keep greater gliders not too hot and not too cold and will help to increase the species' resilience in a changing climate," Ashman said in July 2022.

"Producing and installing high-quality nest boxes is costly," added ANU research fellow Dr. Kara Youngentob, "so this project is very important because it will help us understand if expensive interventions like nest boxes are the best use of funding in our urgent mission to save greater gliders."

It appears that their efforts are paying off.

"What we didn't know was whether these boxes worked and whether they have an impact on the glider population," Dr. Youngentob told ABC News Australia. "Much to our delight, within a few months of them going up they are already being used by gliders, so we know the individuals themselves like them and use them."

According to Youngentob, greater gliders are the largest gliding marsupial at risk of extinction. More than 200 nesting boxes have been installed in Victoria's East Gippsland and in Tallaganda National Park in New South Wales. Youngentob told ABC News Australia that this project will help researchers learn more about how many of the species are left in the wild.

The quiet, nocturnal marsupial faces threats from climate change and deforestation in addition to the wildfires that ravaged Australia in 2020. Their population has fallen by 80% in the past 20 years and the species has maintained an endangered status since July of 2022.

greater gliders, great gliders endangered, australian animals, endangered animals, endangered australian animals, world wildlife fundAn image of two greater glider on a treePhoto credit: Canva

"They're a treasure for this country." Dr. Youngentob told ANU. "And I think the more people know about them, the more that they will fall in love with them and want to protect them too."

This article originally appeared two years ago

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Heroes

Mexico's president reacts to pressure from Leonardo DiCaprio to save a species.

On May 10, 2017, actor and activist Leonardo DiCaprio took to Twitter to save a marine species.

"The vaquita is the most endangered marine mammal in the world," he wrote of the species, which can only be found off Mexico's shores in the Gulf of California. "Join me [and the World Wildlife Fund] and take action."

It may seem like an average tweet, coming from one of the biggest environmental advocates in the world. But the tweet has had global ramifications.

Photo by National Geographic Channel, courtesy of the Everett Collection.

As DiCaprio noted in a Facebook post that same day, unsustainable fishing has caused a steep decline in the total number of vaquitas.

There may only be 30 left in the gulf right now — a 90% drop since 2011 — which also explains why there seem to be so few photos of the rare porpoise in the wild.

A rare photo of a vaquita. Photo by World Wildlife Fund.

One major reason for the falling numbers is China's hunger for the totoaba fish, which also only lives in the Gulf of California. Mexican fishermen use massive gill nets to catch the totoaba and ship the marine animals to China — an illegal practice in itself. But all too often, vaquitas get caught in these nets and are needlessly killed.

This doesn't just affect the vaquita either. Illegal fishing is harming many other marine species in the region, too — species that local communities rely on for food and business.

DiCaprio linked to a petition by the World Wildlife Fund calling on Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto to act now to save the species in his Facebook post and tweet.

Among other demands, the letter urges the president to implement and enforce a permanent gill net fishing ban.

Photo by Alfredo Estrella/AFP/Getty Images.

To Nieto's credit, his government has taken some steps to save the vaquita.

In 2015, Mexico implemented a two-year gill net fishing ban. But it wasn't properly enforced, advocates argued, which helps to explain why vaquita numbers continued to dwindle. What's more, what little effect the ban did have on dissuading fisherman is now gone entirely because the ban expired in April 2017.

DiCaprio's posts did actually catch the attention of the Mexican president, who responded on Twitter.

In a series of tweets, Nieto explained how his government has upped efforts to save the vaquita in recent years, such as expanding its protection zone in the gulf and committing 300 marines and 15 boats to monitor the area.

Still, DiCaprio's call to act seemed to spark new urgency from the Mexican president, who made a very public commitment to ensure the vaquita won't be lost forever.

Not everyone has over 17 million Twitter followers like DiCaprio, but we all have a voice.

Use it to tweet your support for the Word Wildlife Fund's petition and put more pressure on Nieto and Mexico to save the vaquita.

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One of the most endangered birds on the planet just had a huge bounce back.

The kakapo parrot is one of the most endangered species in the world.

There are currently fewer than 200 of the flightless birds from New Zealand on the planet. That's a big problem, especially when you consider that (surprise, surprise) human beings are largely responsible for their dwindling population.

Hundreds of years ago, humans hunted them for their skin and feathers. In the 1800s, land clearance and the introduction of mammalian predators (like dogs) in New Zealand further reduced their ability to survive.

For decades, scientists have exhausted their options trying to bring the kakapo population back from the brink. They've tried everything.

And when I say everything, I mean everything. Including a "sperm helmet" that scientists wore on their heads to collect semen samples after they noticed the kakapos would routinely try to mate with people's heads.

Photo by Neil Sandas/AFP/Getty Images.

Needless to say, it didn't work.

In 2016, though, things are actually looking up for the little birds, as an incredible 33 kakapo chicks were recently born in New Zealand.

Incredibly, the kakapos made it happen all on their own, no sperm helmets needed. Thanks to the conservation efforts of the last several decades, the birds just had a very successful mating season.

They look as terrifying, as baby birds usually do (is it just me?), but their birth represents a huge win for conservation efforts that have been going on since at least 1891.

A conservation scientist who is NOT Bernie Sanders. Photo via Don Merton/Department of Conservation/Flickr.

Protecting endangered species is important for many reasons.

Like biodiversity, balancing ecosystems, and even climate change. It isn't always easy, and it doesn't always work — hell, just think of the poor guy who had to test out the ill-fated sperm helmet.

When it works out though, it's a big win for the world.

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Conservationists in Africa came up with a genius way to save elephants: move them.

Human beings haven't always been the best of friends to elephants.

Photo by Brian Snelson/Flickr.

While we've written some of our most delightful children's books about them...

We've done OK by Babar. Photo by Jean de Brunhoff/Wikimedia Commons.

...we've also poached them for centuries, destroyed their habitats, and generally been pretty bad at sharing our planet with them.

Illegal ivory sits in a storeroom in Kenya. Photo by Carl de Souza/Getty Images.

Recently, conservationists in Malawi decided to tranquilize 500 elephants, pick them up by their hind legs, and drive them almost 200 miles across bumpy savannah on the back of a truck. And while it might look like yet another attempt to mess with these gentle creatures...

Photo by Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP.

...it actually might be the nicest thing we've done for elephants in quite some time.

While the task was anything but nice, the goal was simple: to relocate the animals from two Malawi national parks where they're (relatively) plentiful to a park with more room and, thereby, more safety for the elephants.

"This is very much the way that we'll have to manage things in the future," Craig Reid, manager of the country's Liwonde National Park, told The Associated Press.

According to the AP, who embedded with the team, the project is one of the largest-ever and most logistically complicated relocations of its kind.

Similar moves have been made before, but few have been attempted with so many animals.

Moving the elephants required enlisting a fleet of helicopters, cranes, and trucks as well as a team of dedicated pilots, drivers, and conservationists to manage the creatures as they made their way across the country.

It's the latest attempt to give these giant, emotionally complex animals a chance to recover.

An elephant strides around Kenya. Photo by Tony Karumba/Getty Images.

African elephants — highly social creatures who have been shown to react to each other's pain, soothe suffering friends, and even grieve for their dead — used to number in the millions, but rampant hunting has caused their population decline over decades — by as much as 80% in some areas.

More recently, increases in demand for ivory has led to a surge in poaching, and human encroachment is always a threat.

The World Wildlife Fund estimates their numbers today at approximately 470,000.

Project managers are prioritizing moving the elephants with their families.

An elephant mother with her calf at the London Zoo. Photo by Adrien Dennis/Getty Images.

According to conservationists on the team, keeping mothers and calves together is key to the success of the relocation because elephants, like humans, form tight familial bonds.

Relocating hundreds of the huge creatures is challenging, and there are potential drawbacks.

Some conservationists worry that mass artificial migration could facilitate the spread of disease, and being handled by humans with giant cranes can, understandably, stress out the animals.

But if the end result is more elephants, many experts believe it's a chance worth taking.

Photo by Lucas Schulze/Getty Images.

WWF African species manager Bas Huijbregts told the AP that the relocation project would be "a win-win for elephants and people" and hopes that it "will likely become the new norm in many places in Africa."

The best part? We get to brag about doing the elephants a solid for once.

It may not look like it.

Photo by Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP.

But one day, they'll totally appreciate us for it.

Photo by Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP.

Maybe.

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