People discovered the little creature for the first time on Australia’s Kangaroo Island. A devastating fire destroyed the region a year ago. the terrible fire destroyed nearly 90% of the Island. Scientists believed many species to die forever. But it appears that things are better than originally expected. The pygmy possum is one of more than 20 animals that have been discovered alive.
The discovery was made by Kangaroo Island Land for Wildlife, an organization that works to protect wildlife. Pat Hodgens, a fauna ecologist, told that this is the first example of the species being spotted alive.
Even though fires destroyed nearly 90% of the tiny Dunnart habitat, many animals have +been spotted there since, according to Craig Wickham, managing director of Exceptional Kangaroo Islan. The discovery is good news for the Island, where there were concerns that habitat loss would lead to the extinction of the endangered nocturnal marsupial. There were only 300 to 500 of that species.
The pygmy possum is native to Tasmania and Kangaroo Island, but it has only ever been spotted 113 times. It has intermittently been noticed in Victoria and South Australia. The possum is amazingly small and weighs only 0.35 ounces.
He’s not very common. And the summer forest fires severely damaged the habitat in which that species once grew, but we were still optimistic that we’d find them. It’s crucial right now because many of these species that rely on very old, long-lived, unburned plants consider it to be their last refuge.
The bushfire season of last year was extremely bad and had a significant impact on Australia’s biodiversity. The fire caused the deaths of nearly three billion animals.