![]() ![]() “Roosting trees have been progressively cut down and inappropriate construction surrounding the site allowed to proceed, causing unusually high mortality levels,” he said. Quartermain said the animal was in an extremely precarious state with numbers dwindling to the point it was likely critically endangered, rather than endangered. Under the EPBC Act, the minister is not permitted to act inconsistently with a recovery plan when making a decision about a development or project. The recovery plan for the spectacled flying fox is now a decade old but it specifically lists harassment by humans – which refers to dispersal and other actions to disturb flying foxes – as a known and significant threat to the species. “If we sit back and do nothing we could see that entire population of spectacled flying foxes wiped out,” he said. Entsch said the council had spent time planning the dispersal and the alternative site it had identified was known habitat where there was an existing population of the animals. “If we leave them there, they’re going to die because they are very isolated,” he said. He said in summer the flying foxes were at risk of overheating because the area was surrounded by concrete and asphalt. “The establishment of unpredictable splinter camps that will exacerbate conflicts is the most likely outcome.”īut Warren Entsch, the local MP, said the dispersal was necessary because the colony was isolated to only a few trees. “Framing this as a relocation and marking out a ‘proposed relocation site’ nearby gives a semblance of control, but it’s farcical to think people can designate where these exhausted and desperate bats will land and somehow guide them there,” said Evan Quartermain, HSI’s director of programs. The HSI has sought a statement of reasons from the government for its approval of the dispersal plan. It followed a long campaign by Humane Society International to have declines in populations of spectacled flying foxes acknowledged and came after Guardian Australia highlighted lengthy delays in the listing of threatened species. In February 2019, the former environment minister Melissa Price upgraded the species’ status from vulnerable to endangered after years of government delay. ![]() But environmental organisations fear the plan will cause more distress for animals already under pressure. ![]()
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