00:00Two koalas, once on the brink of death, are released back into the wild.
00:19Both came into the care of RSPCA Queensland, infected with chlamydia.
00:24They can become incontinent, they can't see particularly well, so quite often when they
00:29come in they're in poor body condition, they can be dehydrated.
00:33But their chances of survival are limited by a shortage of the chlamydia vaccine and
00:38by housing developments in the area, which are encroaching on their habitat.
00:44We've got to the point now, this year it's like a line in the sand, if we keep going,
00:50the koalas that are left here have nowhere else to go, they've been cut off.
00:57More development proposals threaten the future of koalas in the Woogaroo forest in the Ipswich
01:03local government area.
01:05While these sites may not pose a major threat on their own, if all are approved, experts
01:11say it will dramatically reduce available habitat.
01:16And so it's that death by a thousand cut sort of thing.
01:19Wildlife experts estimate between 12 and 16,000 koalas remain in the wild across South East Queensland.
01:27They treat about 1,300 each year.
01:31Of those, at least half don't survive.
01:39But there is hope.
01:41I'm going to listen in for a female called Matilda.
01:45Using GPS technology, researcher Sean Fitzgibbon tracks a collared koala in bushland in Brisbane's
01:53South West. Matilda is among several young displaced koalas being used to successfully re-establish
02:01locally extinct populations like this one in Wacol.
02:06We've placed more than a dozen animals here now and we're seeing already we've had the first
02:12generation and now the second generation coming through.
02:15As South East Queensland continues to grow and with the Olympics just seven years away,
02:22the need to strike the right balance between development and the environment has never been
02:29more important.
02:32I don't want to be somebody who stands there with Olympic visitors and says look,
02:38I could have shown you koalas in the wild, but I'm sorry I can't because they're now extinct.
02:42Because the powers that be decided they weren't worth it.
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