Echidna: Conservation

Episode 65: Echidna: Conservation

Summary: What does the future of the echidna look like? Join Kiersten as she discusses echidna conservation

 

For my hearing impaired listeners, a complete transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean

Show Notes:

Short-beaked Echidna (Tachyglossus aculeates) Fact Sheet: Population and Conservation Status, San Diego Wildlife Alliance Library. https://iecl.libguides.com

“The Long-beaked Echidna: can we save the earth’s oldest living mammal?”, by Andrew L. Mack, 26 October 2015, Mongabay. https://news.mongabay.com

EchidnaCSI: https://www.adelaide.edu.au/environment/research/citizen-science/echidna-csi/echidna-research-conservation

echidnacsi@adelaide.edu.au

Expedition Cyclops: https://www.expeditioncyclops.org/echidna

Music written and performed by Katherine Camp

 

Transcript 

(Piano music plays)

Kiersten - This is Ten Things I Like About…a ten minute, ten episode podcast about unknown or misunderstood wildlife.

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Welcome to Ten Things I Like About… I’m Kiersten, your host, and this is a podcast about misunderstood or unknown creatures in nature. Some we’ll find right out side our doors and some are continents away but all are fascinating. 

This podcast will focus ten, ten minute episodes on different animals and their amazing characteristics. Please join me on this extraordinary journey, you won’t regret it.

This is the last episode of echidnas, and I have to say I’m sorry to see them go. They have been such an interesting animal to talk about. And as usual the last episode is all about the conservation work being done to ensure their continued survival. 

The short-beaked echidna is the most wide spread native mammal in Australia and is protected on the continent but that doesn’t mean they aren’t feeling the strain of our changing planet. Loss of habitat, loss of food resources, over-hunting, and problems encountered due to changing temperatures are problems all species of echidnas face. Another man-made problem threatening echidnas is feral dogs. They have no problems tracking echidnas and making a meal of them.

Of our four species of echidnas, the short-beaked echidna is doing the best conservation wise. Overall, their populations are stable in the area that have been studied. An estimate made in 2017 says 5 to 50 million individual short-beaked echidnas may live in Australia. They are given a Least Concern status by the IUCN.

The long-beaked echidnas are a different story.

Over hunting of the long-beaked echidna is problematic. Since the 1960’s the long-beaked echidna has experienced an 80% loss of population. All long-beaked echindas, which is three out of the four species of echidna, are  considered critically endangered by the IUCN. 

Here’s where the echidna and human stories twine together in a plicated braid. Indigenous peoples of the New Guinea are relied on echidnas and tree kangaroos as food sources. These two animals are the largest mammals native to this area. Back when human numbers were low, this wasn’t a problem. A few echidna were hunted for meat and the populations were allowed to replenish keeping up with the small amount taken for hunting. 

In 2015, a study done estimating the hunting of long-beaked echidna by Indigenous peoples found that in seven months hunters from 33 clans in two tribes killed and consumed 16 long-beaked echidnas. It doesn’t sound like a lot but, that is more than 25% of all the known specimens in the world ever collected. There are over 800 tribes in Papua New Guinea and thousands of clans with a taste for the echidna. Modern technology and dogs have made hunting for them even easier. It’s a fine line here with conservation efforts because we don’t want to take away from the importance of preserving indigenous peoples way of life, but this activity is also wiping out an animal that is older than human history. Researchers and educators must tread carefully but quickly to prevent the extinction of this animal.

The biggest problem here is that the tribes are like separate countries. They all have different languages and different ways of life, so setting aside an area to protect the echidna is simply not possible. You have to approach each group of people and talk to the individually and explain the problems that the echidna faces. It can be done but it relies on time the long-beaked echidnas may not have left. But conservationists have not given up hope.

What is being done to ensure the survival of this animal that has lived on this planet longer than any other mammal? 

Australia has laws in place that protect echidnas from exploitation and has set aside wild place as refuges for them, as well as other native wildlife. Researchers continue to study all species of echidna to learn about how they live and what they rely on to survive. With this information new regulations can be crafted to protect the animal itself and the resources they need to survive. 

This is the most difficult area of conservation though, because most species are nocturnal and live in dense forest ares. This makes it very difficult to find and observe them. The ones that live in more open area live high up in altitude which also makes it difficult for us to find and follow them. 

In Papua New Guinea individual landowners have begun to work with conservationist by agreeing to not hunt echidnas on their land. The Hogave Conservation Area was established as a no-hunting zone thirty years ago by a tribal chief in the area. Elsewhere in Papua New Guinea conservation groups are working locally with individuals to spread the word about echidna populations and hope for their survival there has greatly improved. 

On a happy note, Sir David’s long-beaked echidna, thought to be extinction for over 60 years was rediscovered in 2023. An expedition to the Cyclops Mountains in Indonesia had high hopes in finding this long lost echidna. They had heard rumors and received reports from local Indigenous people that echidna still roamed the region, but not hard evidence had surfaced. In 2023, one last effort was made by the University of Oxford to determine if the stories where true. And they did it! They captured film footage of the animal proving this species of long-beaked echidna is still alive today! It leaves you with hope that the other species may survive against all odds as well.

For my listeners in Australia, I’m not sure I have any listeners in Austraila, I hope I do, and other areas where echidnas are found there is a citizen science project you can join to help researchers at the University of Adelaide collect important information about echidnas. The program is called EchidnaCSI and anyone can join! CSI stand for Conservation Science Initiative and you can contact the university by emailing echidnacsi@adelaide.edu.au. I’ll post this link in my show notes for this episode.

For those of you outside Australia that want to help echidnas, do what I’m doing, get the word out there about these amazing animals. The more people know about these animals they more they will care and that is the best step to helping them survive.

You can also contribute to Expedition Cyclops. Now that we have definitive proof that Sir David’s long-beaked echidna still lives, more research is needed to ensure their continued survival. I’ll post a link to Expedition Cyclops in my show notes.

I’m going to end on a hopeful note for the echidna because it’s my tenth favorite thing about this legendary animal. Thank you so much for joining me for my series on echidnas.

If you're enjoying this podcast please recommend me to friends and family and take a moment to give me a rating on whatever platform your listening. It will help me reach more listeners and give the animals I talk about an even better chance at change. 

 

I’ll be taking a break after this series but I’ll be back in March of 2024 with brand new episodes of Ten Things I Like About.…     

 

(Piano Music plays) 

This has been an episode of Ten Things I like About with Kiersten and Company. Original music written and performed by Katherine Camp, piano extraordinaire.