Platypus playground

Geoff Williams and Melody Serena check platypus numbers at Noreuil Park at the start of the platypus study. Picture: BLAIR THOMSON

THIS summer could see one of the best platypus breeding seasons in the Albury Wodonga region for a number of years.

That’s the conclusion of Australian Platypus Conservancy biologists after searching for platypuses last week at a series of sites along the Murray River as part of a study supported by  Albury paper mill Norske Skog.

Conservancy biologist Geoff Williams said that as many as five platypuses had been recorded in the two kilometre long section from Union Bridge to West Albury.

At this time of the year, it is lactating females that are most likely to be observed during daylight hours.

The mothers produce a rich milk to feed their babies and need to find up to 90 per cent of their own bodyweight in food (mainly made up of tiny aquatic invertebrates) per 24-hour period to keep up with this high energy demand.

With summer nights being so short, the animals often need to continue feeding well into daylight periods to reach their quota.

Platypus breeding success was severely depressed in much of NSW and Victoria during the recent long stretch of drought years, while flooding in many regions last summer thwarted prospects of a good breeding result.

However, steady but not excessive rainfall throughout this spring and summer has created fl ow conditions that could result in a bumper crop of juveniles.

Young platypus start to emerge from their nursery burrows in late January and early February.

The juveniles face a number of risks when they first encounter the wide world, especially if their home includes areas frequented by humans.

Because they are quite small to start with, juvenile platypus can easily swim into opera house yabby nets and similar enclosed traps and drown.

It is illegal to use such traps in the Murray and other rivers around Albury Wodonga because of the threats they pose to platypus and other aquatic species such as native water-rats and turtles.

Entanglement in litter also poses a big problem for platypus.

“During our recent field work we picked up no less than three tangles of fishing line that had been discarded on the river bank in Albury’s Noreuil Park,” Mr Williams said.

“If line gets caught around a platypus it results in terrible injuries and slow, painful death.

“Plastic rings such as six-pack holders and the tamper-proof seals around many food and beverage containers are also a killer.

“Rings of only five or six centimetres in diameter can get caught around the neck or chest of a juvenile platypus and then cause horrific damage as the animal grows.”

Juvenile platypus are also somewhat naive and sometimes wander up on to the river bank, making them any easy target for predators.

Accordingly, dog-owners need to be alert when exercising their pets near the river at this time of the year and keep them under close control.

The platypus study at Albury Wodonga is now well into its second year and constitutes part of Norske Skog’s commitment to supporting research into the condition of the Murray River, including detailed studies of water quality and aquatic invertebrates.

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Posted by admin on Jan 19 2012. Filed under Local News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry