CANBERRA, Feb. 12 (Xinhua) -- As many as 90 percent of the koalas on Kangaroo Island off the coast of South Australia (SA) could perish during catastrophic bushfires in December and January.
The koalas on Kangaroo Island were considered an "insurance population" for the species because they were free of the chlamydia that affects many koalas on the mainland, causing blindness, infertility and death.
However, according to estimates released by the Wildlife, Ecosystems and Habitat Bushfire Recovery Taskforce on Wednesday, 5,000-10,000 koalas remain on the island compared to approximately 60,000 before the fires.
More than a third of the island, a popular tourist destination, was burned by fires that began amid catastrophic conditions late in December.
Sam Mitchell, the manager of the Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park, told News Corp Australia that the park took in 600 koalas to protect them from the fires but only half survived.
He said that the biggest challenge in rebuilding the population would be the lack of habitat.
"You go out there and see there was one or two trees that didn't burn and you'll see 30 koalas in there," he said.
"We can move them from one small pocket to another pocket that didn't burn but we need to check that area and make sure they're not going to overpopulate it and cause more issues."
"Kangaroo Island was considered the insurance population -- the chlamydia-free population of koalas -- so when you have anywhere up to 60,000 that's a pretty good number that could save the species, and now we're down to 10,000 so that's another problem."
The Environment Department has previously said that it is confident that the population will recover.
