Orphaned numbat joeys are in good hands at Perth Zoo after a remarkable rescue from Dr Tony Friend

A litter of tiny numbat joeys were rescued last week by leading WA conservationist Tony Friend and are lucky to be alive. Dr Friend, principal research scientist with the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions rescued three numbat siblings after discovering their mother had been taken by a raptor in Dryandra Woodlands. Dr Friend said he had been monitoring the numbat mother, originally born at Perth Zoo two years ago. “I’ve been monitoring a number of numbats with radio collars in Dryandra, this particular one was inside the Dryandra sanctuary in the fenced area for numbats and woylies,” he said. Dr Friend realised something was wrong when the mother’s radio collar signal was no longer coming from the burrow. “I thought this was strange because it was early morning and they should have still been in bed, so I followed the signal and found the remains of the mother and the collar,” he said. “There were tufts of hair on the ground which was a sure sign a bird of prey got to her. “I knew the young would die as there was no one else to look after them, so I went to the burrow, dug it up, managed to get the joeys into bags and rang Perth Zoo.” The joeys have since been delivered into the zoo’s care where unfortunately, the runt of the litter has died. Once they are weaned, the aim is to release the numbats back to Dryandra, one of the last wild strongholds for this endangered species. Dr Friend said the joeys were extremely lucky to be saved. “We often find the remains of mothers’ that we knew had young but didn’t know where they were,” he said. “These joeys were very lucky, as there was such intensive monitoring going on that we had recent contact with the young so we knew they were there in the burrow.”