How many visitors can a Koala bear?

Koalas can become stressed by noisy and up-close encounters with human visitors, a University of Melbourne study has determined.

The koala is a much-loved Australian icon and extremely popular with foreign tourists, but little work had been done to understand how they cope with human interaction.

Dr Jean-Loup Rault from the University's Animal Welfare Science Centre said researchers set out to answer this question.

“Our study showed that up-close and noisy encounters with human visitors resulted in koalas showing so called 'increased vigilance', which is a common response to stress."

"Stress is generally an energy-costly mechanism. This could be a problem as koalas survive on an extremely low energy diet — largely made up of Eucalyptus leaves — and minimize energy expenditure by sleeping 20 hours a day."

Researchers tested the effect of visitor numbers, visitor noise, and visitor proximity on koalas at the Koala Conservation Centre, which forms part of the Phillip Island Nature Parks network.

“This work also highlights the value and importance of behavioural observations as a monitoring tool to assess visitor-related stress in koalas” according to Zoo's Victoria's Sally Sherwen, a collaborator on the study.

The research raises questions about the classic trade off between visitor education and animal welfare.

“Some wildlife parks offer close encounters or even hands on experiences with koalas," said Dr Rault.

"Only now are we beginning to understand the impact of these visitor encounters on koalas’ behaviour and welfare."

'Number of nearby visitor and noise level affect vigilance in captive koalas' is published in the May edition of Applied Animal Behaviour Science.

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Scientists Discover Unique Voice Organ in Koalas

An international team of biologists led by Dr Benjamin D. Charlton from the University of Sussex has discovered that koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) possess a unique sound-producing organ that has never before been seen in any other land-dwelling mammal.

During the breeding season, male koalas produce low-pitched mating calls that are characterized by a continuous series of inhalation and exhalation sections, and an extremely low fundamental frequency. The pitch of these calls is about twenty times lower than it should be, given the koala’s relatively small size.

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Koala Bears

Koala bears, as a species, have long been identified as cute cuddly creatures, with countless plushie variations of their likeness found in countless toy stores and fair grounds.

The 2006 CGI-animated Disney movie The Wild, featured a koala as one of its main characters, one whose presence in the movie can be easily understood given how popular koala bears are.

Given their cuteness, questions related to the actual ownership of koala bears as pets have been asked by millions of children more than once. Much to their disappointment, however, the actual feasibility of owning a koala bear as a pet is not realistic for private home owners, but possible for research personnel and animal reservation sites.

Native to Australia, koala bears are creatures which cannot be owned as pets legally. Special permits which require certain prerequisites are required from wildlife centers and researchers, who can’t even indefinitely keep koalas with them throughout their respective life spans.

As animals, koalas are not like cats or dogs, in the sense that they can be readily domesticated. Being nocturnal, they’re not really as much fun as one would presume them to be, with koalas actually being notorious for being grouchy at certain occasions.

That plus their steady diet of eucalyptus leaves makes them quite troublesome to keep as pets for private homeowners, who need to keep a steady supply for koalas to consume. Dedicated wildlife centers have no qualms satisfying a koala bear’s particular needs and requirements in this sense though, which is a different story altogether.

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Crazy Fun Facts About Koala

Koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is a arboreal herbivorous marsupila native to Australia, Koala's are found in the coastal regions of eastern and southern Australia from Adelaide to the southern part of Cape York Peninsula.

Wombat (picture from wiki.com)

  Koala (picture from wiki.com) 

A koala are often mistaken for a wombat or a type of bear hence the name "Koala bear", the only difference is that a koala has a thicker coat of fur, large ears and a longer limbs. Usually spends its time up a eucalyptus tree eating the leaves and resting or sleeping for about 18 hours a day.

A baby koala is called a "joey" it is remained hidden in a mother koala's pouch for atleast six months feeding on milk, at 8 months old "joeys" begins to explore outside but remained near the mother or riding at its back at this stage it begin to consume small amounts of mothers "pap" inorder to inoculate its gut with microbes necessary to digest eucalyptus leaves upon adulthood.

Koalas walk on all four legs when walking on the ground, joey clinging to the back (picture from wiki.com)

The Australian Government now list the koala as a priority species for conservation status assessment, the estimates of the national koala population numbers are in hundreds of thousand, although other studies have estimated that as few as 80,000 koala's are left in the wild.

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Koala

Koala Animal

Koala (Phascolarctos cinereus) is one of the marsupial animals, animals from Australia and is a typical representative of the family only Phascolarctidae.

Koalas can be found along the east coast of Australia from Adelaide to Cape York Peninsula, and until far into the hinterland as there is sufficient rainfall to support suitable forests for koalas.

Koala able to climb trees with skilled and can cling to trees because their long arms and sharp claws, ua finger separate the front of the other three fingers. If we compare it with human hands, as if they had two thumbs. Thumb, which is very different from the other fingers, to help them stick to the small branches. Like hooks, nails koala stuck in the tree, and thus stick to the surface of the trunk is soft and smooth. This is what makes life easy koalas in the trees.

Koala known as a very lazy animal, they can move very quickly in the trees. In fact they can jump from one branch to another, a distance of one meter with a single bound. Female koala bear a child every two years, and just like kangaroos, they take care of her son in a pouch. During the first month, the baby koala lives in its mother's pouch. After this period, the baby koala and then climb back their mothers for a year. Parent koala makes a favorite tree in the eucalyptus forest to be home because they eat eucalyptus leaves - and that's just their food! This is why you can find a koala in Australia, where eucalyptus trees abundant.

Although there are more than 600 species of eucalyptus trees in Australia, koalas only eat certain leaves of 35 species among them. Koalas can not live in any place because, besides being a store of leaves, eucalyptus tree is a special residence for them. There are many different types of koalas. Each takes a different eucalyptus leaves. If you plan to move a koala, you must bring with eucalyptus leaves are eaten. Koalas are very rarely out of the tree because they are difficult to move on the ground.

Eucalyptus leaves are composed of different chemical substances. These chemicals are toxic and harmful to the animals except for koalas. Before swallowing, koalas munching leaves it with his teeth. Hazardous substances in the leaves were filtered in koala liver tissue expelled from the body. Food that is highly toxic to other animals, do not endanger the koala. In fact, koalas can eat a kilogram of leaves of the poisoned every day without problem. Even they get water from these leaves. In certain seasons, two thirds of eucalyptus leaf consists of water. Therefore, only by eating eucalyptus leaves, koalas can survive without drinking water. The tops of eucalyptus trees can be very windy. For this reason, the koala has very thick fur.

Harmony between a poisonous plant and an animal shows that the koala and eucalyptus trees have been created by the same Creator. This Creator, who created everything perfectly, surely God, the Lord of hosts.

Koala Pets

Koalas and Eucalyptus leaves

they are inseparable

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