Behind the News Specials – Animal Issues

The content in these specials will support students from Years 5 - 8 to achieve a range of understandings within an Essential Learnings curriculum. The stories emphasise investigation, communication and participation, encouraging students to be reflective thinkers about a range of issues taught in schools.

State / Territory / Levels
Victoria / Level 4 & 5
SA / Standard 3 & 4
WA / Level 3 & 4
NT / Band 3 & 4
Qld / Level 3 & 4
NSW / Stage 3 & 4
Tasmania / Band B – Grade 5/6
Band C - Junior Secondary
ACT / Upper Primary
Lower High School

Curriculum Links

SOSE/HSIE – History: environmental issues

How and why people try to understand and preserve animals in our world?

This program includes stories about:

  • How people around the world can help save the great apes.
  • Culling koalas – agree or disagree?
  • Using science to save the Tasmanian devils.
  • Psychic pets – can it be proved scientifically?
  • Controversy over Importing Asian elephants for a Sydney Zoo.

Hi, and welcome to our special look at animals, I'm Krista Eleftheriou. First today, we all like to use mobile phones, game consoles and a range of electronic gear. But what's that got to do with gorillas being killed? You might be surprised.

Sarah Martinelli, reporting

Because so many of us are now using mobile phones, great apes are threatened in the wild

Huh?

True. That goes for laptops too, and playing computer games. Sounds crazy, but sadly it's true.

It all comes down to this substance, it's called coltan, and it's made from tantalum. It's used in mobile phones, laptops, games consoles, pagers, and those sort of electronic devices. And it is mined here, in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo, in Africa.

Now the mining isn't such a problem, it's what the miners do when they're out in the jungles, mining the tantalum that is the problem.

It's called bush meat.

Ian Redmond, Great Ape Survival Project: Bush meat is just a term for the meat of wild animals. In Europe we call it game meat, in Australia I guess you call it bush tucker and that's fine if there very few people and a lot of animals, but the situation in Africa is now there are more and more people and fewer and fewer animals. And even species like gorillas and chimpanzees and bonobos are killed for their meat.

That's right, the miners are eating endangered species, basically becuase there is not much else out in the jungle to eat. That's how this substance, coltan, is helping to destroy Africa's great apes.

Ian Redmond, Great Ape Survival Project: Coltan is particularly dangerous to the eastern lowland gorillas and we think they might have lost something like 80 or 90 % of their numbers in the last few years cos of the boom in electronic equipment.

What can you do to help?

Ian Redmond, Great Ape Survival Project: Just here from your home here in Australia, you can write a letter. Who would you write to? Well write to your MP, they're there to represent your opinions,and if you haven't told them your opinions, and if you haven't said well this is really important to me, well how can they do that? So that's maybe 50 cents.

Ian Redmond, Great Ape Survival Project: If you're buying anything electronic write to the manufacturer, send them an email saying look I wanna buy your games console can you guarantee that you're helping to solve this problem and not just washing your hands of it, so use your power.

Ian Redmond, Great Ape Survival Project: What people have to understand is that they are going to stop eating gorillas and chimps and they can choose whether they stop in 20 years time when the last one's gone or they can stop now and there will always be gorillas and chimps in the forest.

To some native animals now, too many of them in fact! It’s an unusual problem, and it's happening on a small island off the coast of South Australia. The koala population is increasing and soon there won't be enough food to go around.

Sarah Martinelli reporting

Koalas - they're a national symbol of Australia, and one of our most loved creatures. They're also a huge tourist attraction, and are recognised throughout the world. But in some parts of Australia, guys like Osmond are causing huge problems.

This is Kangaroo Island, off the coast of South Australia, and this is where koalas are eating themselves out of their homes! They're not even native to the island, they were brought here in the 1920s, because they were being hunted for their fur, and their numbers were dropping on the mainland. Back then; about 20 koalas were taken to Kangaroo Island. Fast-forward 85 years, and there are about 27 thousand of them!

Koalas eat up to 1000 leaves a day, that's a lot of manna gum leaves being taken from trees, trees that other native animals need, like the brushtail possum. Most people agree there's a problem, but there's no easy solution.

Leave the koalas alone.

Deb Kelly, SA Parks and Wildlife : If we do nothing the population's going to continue to increase and that means that eventually we'll have koalas starving and nobody wants to see that happen.

Relocation: move the koalas somewhere else.

DEB KELLY: In Victoria they have been relocated and what happens is then they continue to breed, and you don't actually just move the koalas, you move the problem because they keep breeding and instead of ending up starving in the place they were originally the new population increases until you have exactly the same problem.

Sterilisation. It’s sort of like desexing a dog or cat. It means the koalas can't have any more babies, so the population won't increase. This is the solution the South Australian government has chosen.

DEB KELLY: There's really not a problem with sterilisation, it is expensive it costs about 100 dollars an animal, but from the animals' point of view there really isn't an issue with it, that's fine.

Cull them. Kill the koalas so that they can't damage the trees. Not all the koalas, but enough to ease the pressure on the trees.

DEB KELLY: Culling is the obvious solution but it's not one that's acceptable, I mean people don't want to see animals like this shot or put down with a drug overdose or anything like that and the international community loves them and they just won't accept killing them.

So why is culling such a problem?

This is the image the rest of the world sees when they think of koalas, a cute harmless furry lump. A lot of people think there'd be international outrage if the koalas were culled.

It's a big problem, and the solution for now is to sterilise about 650 Kangaroo Island koalas this year, then move most of that group to the state's south east. But it may not be enough to save the koalas from themselves.

To another native Australian animal now, the Tasmanian Devil. Scientists are worried that they might become extinct if a cure can't be found for a mysterious disease. Now I must tell you it doesn't look very nice, but Sarah's been very careful not to use any really gross pictures.

Sarah Martinelli, reporting

The Tasmanian devil is the world's largest meat-eating marsupial. And just look at the jaws on this one! Devils live on dead animals, so they need to be able to crunch down on bones, and break through thick skin. Which is why a Tasmanian devil has biting power as strong as a dog about 4 times its weight.

Although this one's in an enclosure at the Adelaide Zoo, I’m still not taking any chances. But Tasmanian Devils are facing a huge problem right now. In the wild in Tasmania they're dying from a nasty disease, and the race is on to help them!

The problem - and I'm warning you, it's pretty gross. Scientists think it's some sort of cancer. These cancers make it difficult for the animals to eat, which makes them weak. After about three to five months the animal dies from starvation and breakdown of body functions.

No one is really sure, but it's thought the cancer may be spread when the devils bite each other, which they do a lot! This disease first appeared nine years ago. Since then, it's wiped out about half the wild population of Tasmania's 100-150 thousand devils. If it continues like this, it could mean the end of the Tasmanian devil in the wild.

One idea is to fence them off - finding disease free areas and building devil-proof fences around them, to prevent any further spread. Or keeping them on islands, were they can be free from another big problem, the fox!

But perhaps the best chance for the survival of these creatures is the populations in the zoos. The plan is to take a few babies to other zoos around the country, where they can hopefully breed more disease-free devils. But Devils only live for about 6 years, and in their lifetime, will only produce a few litters of pups. If a solution isn't found, they may go the same way as another famous Tasmanian creature, the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger.

Well let's hope that doesn't happen! To a favourite animal now … the dog. And would you believe, some people think their pets are psychic. Now we reckon this sounded a bit sus’ so David thought we'd better put it to the test.

Hi. Don't you love your pet? Sometimes they seem to know exactly what you’re thinking, don't you Hector? If they can really read minds, that makes them psychic. Oooooh!

PAUL, DOG OWNER: My dog's name is Cordie and she can predict storms.

Studies are showing animals may have extrasensory perception.

MELISSA, DOG OWNER: They seem to have this uncanny ability to know when I'll be coming over.

So psychic pets - urban myth or scientific fact? Let’s put them to the test.

MELISSA, DOG OWNER: They run up to the gate and they look around for me. They do it apparently about an hour or so before I turn up, which strangely enough is almost exactly how long it will take me door to door to get here.

It's the next morning and Jonica's got one camera team with the dogs, and another across town with Melissa. How good are Melissa's dog's telepathic powers? Will they read her mind and run to the gate? And if so, at what point in the journey?

While we wait, let's check out other kinds of dog ESP. Remember Cordie? Science is confirming pets have the power to predict freak weather. Cordie does this with her super-hearing; she can hear four times better than humans. But scientists also suspect an extra sense. Dogs have tiny vibration detectors in the pads of their feet. And thunder - like earthquakes - produces seismic vibrations in the ground they can feel.

So are the dogs responding to Melissa's driving yet? How good are their powers of mental telepathy?

MELISSA, DOG OWNER: Okay, we're almost around the corner.

Unfortunately, the dogs only responded when Melissa drove into the driveway. Even then, they didn't wag their tails until they heard her voice. So, although our test showed no evidence that the dogs have telepathy, it is discovering the incredible extrasensory powers dogs do have of touch and hearing. Aren't they great!

Finally today… to elephants. Asian elephants are endangered in the wild, so a program to bring them into Australian zoos for breeding would be a good idea, right? Well, as Sarah reports not all wildlife groups think so.

Sarah Martinelli, reporting

This is the Asian elephant. It's different from the African elephant; it has smaller ears, and is smaller all over. It's also endangered - that means there's a real danger it could become extinct.

The biggest threat is the loss of habitat. About 20% of the world's population lives in or near the range of Asian elephants. The elephants' homes are being cleared due to war, farming, housing, and logging. So you'd think a plan to bring some to Australia for a breeding program would make everyone happy.

Well, this zoo doesn't even have any elephants, apart from this one, but then again there are only 4 zoos in Australia that do. Sydney's Taronga Zoo and the Melbourne Zoo are trying to import eight Asian elephants from Thailand. But some people are against the idea, so much so that they are going to court to try to stop the animals being brought to Australia.

Elephants take up a lot of space, are zoos big enough to keep them? This is the way they used to live in Australian zoos; they were there to draw crowds. But it wasn't a happy existence for the animals and no one wants to see that happen again. Taronga zoo has spent $40 million on a new enclosure. That issue aside there's another question: what good will a breeding program do?

Animal welfare groups say that even if the zoos breeding programs are successful, that won't increase the numbers of Asian elephants in the wild. Zoos argue that the population of animals in zoos is a kind of back up, so if anything drastic does happen to animals in the wild, the species won't be wiped out.

If the elephants do breed, it will be an Australian first. No Australian zoo has ever managed to breed an Asian elephant in captivity.

And we'll certainly let you know if they have any success!

Well that's it for our Behind the News special about animals. I'm Krista Eleftheriou, see ya next time.