Protecting koalas in northern NSW

A DEDICATED team of volunteers at Friends of the Koala in Lismore is helping to save one of Australia’s most iconic endangered species.

With over 100 volunteers, the organisation rescues, rehabilitates, and releases more than 300 koalas each year, working tirelessly to ensure sick and injured animals receive life-saving care.

“That’s pretty high,” said volunteer coordinator Jennifer Ridolfi. “Around Lismore, the population is pretty solid—we’re lucky there are a lot of properties around that have kept the eucalypts. But they are in danger, they are in trouble.”

Staff at the centre are funded by the World Wide Fund and the International Fund for Animal Welfare, but the work of volunteers is crucial.

Ms Ridolfi is tasked with ensuring the operation runs smoothly.

“We have volunteers who look after the koalas, and I look after the volunteers,” she said.

Volunteers answer the organisation’s hotline, rescue koalas, look after their habitat during rehabilitation, collect food, grow new trees, and maintain the facility.

The Friends of the Koala hotline (6622 1233), is staffed 24 hours a day and takes between two to three calls daily about sick or injured koalas.

The leaf team is kept busy seven days a week collecting a van full of eight kinds of eucalypts to suit the koalas’ dietary needs.

The centre is looking for new volunteers who can give at least half a day to the centre, especially those who can work on the weekend.

Volunteers manning the hotline can do so from home, and while it isn’t constant work, they need to be available to answer calls.

They receive training and mentoring to learn how to handle koalas and to identify food trees.

People over 55 can sign up for 15 hours a week to meet their Centrelink requirements.

The work can be sad, Ms Ridolfi said, but it was rewarding for volunteers to see koalas returned to the wild after treatment.

“We encourage our volunteers to go out and watch a release to make sure they see the good stuff.”

To volunteer, go to www.friendsofthekoala.org.