Kanyana Wildlife

We hope everyone is staying safe and warm during this wet and windy weather ⛈️🌀!

Please remember to keep an eye out for any injured, sick and displaced wildlife 👀, while you are out on the road or if you are cleaning up fallen trees on your property. Falling branches and trees are a serious injury risk for vulnerable animals and many may be suffering with fractures, ulcerated corneas, concussions, lacerations and internal injuries. Injured wildlife can be frightened, disoriented, in pain and vulnerable to cars, foxes and pets. Some may have lost their trees hollows or been blown off course during long flights.

Turtles are also at risk on our roads, as they are starting to travel between wetlands, in response to the rain and low pressure system.

🚑 If you find an animal in need of help, please gently catch it up in a towel and transport to us in a secure pet carrier as soon as possible (no food or water). You may need to use thick welding or gardening gloves. You can provide a safe source of heat by covering a heat pad or warm water bottle in a towel and placing it in the box, next to but not underneath the animal (so it can regulate its own heat). Please keep your car quiet and warm during transport.

☎️ Please message us anytime (or call a 24 hour vet, overnight), if you would like any advice about a rescue. If your call is about an adult kangaroo, large reptile or snake, please call the Wildcare Helpline on 9474 9055.

🌱 If you have any fallen leafy eucalyptus tips or small thin leafy branches (less than 2cm in diameter, as per the shot-hole borer guidelines), our patients would really appreciate them as well!

Thanks everyone and please stay safe.

STOP PRESS 📰 🗞

We are running very low in the NEWSPAPERS we use every day in our hospital, isolation unit and breezeway, to keep our patients' enclosures clean and dry! If you have any newspapers in your recycling at home, we would love it if you could divert some our way, please ♻️ .

To save us time while making up enclosures, we would really appreciate it if everyone could:

✂️ please remove any STAPLED or GLOSSY sections first (we can't use these sorry)

📲 comment below or message us before you drop off, just so we can manage our shed storage (we have limited dry storage at this time of year)

🌿 If you don't have newspaper, but you do have a bucket of young, soft Eucalyptus, Banksia, Hakea, Woollybush, native Peppermint, Callistemon, Melaleuca or other local native leafy tips and flowers (no plant diseases, pesticide-free, woody materials

INTRODUCTION TO WILDLIFE REHABILITATION IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA 🐢
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Perth’s four major wildlife hospitals are pleased to announce that the next session of our wildlife rehabilitation training is open for bookings!⁠
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This comprehensive two-day course introduces you to the foundational skills needed to care for injured, sick, orphaned and displaced native birds, mammals and reptiles in an offsite care setting. Learn about the legal and ethical framework that protects native animal health, welfare and ecology and hear from experienced wildlife rehabilitators about the complexities, challenges and rewards of wildlife rehabilitation.

We particularly encourage people living in peri-urban, rural or remote areas - where wildlife rehabilitation services are more difficult to access – to attend.

📆 Sat 25 July – Sun 26 July 2026⁠
⏱ 9am – 5pm⁠
🏥 Darling Range Wildlife, Martin
🎫 $350 (2 days), $200 (1 day)⁠
🌎 events.humanitix.com/wragwa_july2026
📧 [email protected]
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This course is brought to you by the Wildlife Rehabilitation Advisory Group of Western Australia: a joint collaboration between Kanyana Wildlife, WA Wildlife, Darling Range Wildlife and Perth Wildlife Hospital.

To practice as a wildlife rehabilitator after the course, participants will need to apply for a license with the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, follow the Code of Practice for Wildlife Rehabilitation in Western Australia and align with an established wildlife group, for ongoing mentoring and support.⁠

Please take care, whenever you see black cockatoos near the road 🖤🤍🖤!

This young Carnaby’s Black Cockatoo was spotted on the ground in a laneway in Bateman, recently - not far from Murdoch University and a number of very busy roads. When we went out to rescue her, we found her crouched quietly against the fence, fluffed up and showing signs of concussion and shock. She also had a slightly dropped right wing, which made us concerned that she might have suffered a fracture or other internal injuries.

After we gently captured her with a large soft towel, we took her straight to the wonderful vets at Perth Zoo, who manage the initial care of all three of our black cockatoo species. Although she had been able to stand and turn about (and hiss) in her pet carrier, we were still worried about her prognosis - so we were incredibly relieved to hear later that her x-rays were clear and that she had only suffered mild bruising from her ordeal ✨️. She has now been transferred to the amazing team at Kaarakin Black Cockatoo Conservation Centre, for her rehabilitation.

Sadly, our relief for this individual bird is qualified by our larger concern for her species. BirdLife Australia have found that Carnaby’s populations have dropped by 50% in the last 50 years, as their jarrah-marri and banksia woodlands are lost to mining, agriculture, housing, roads and other projects, as well as drought and fire. Our relentless (and occasionally illegal) destruction of black cockatoo habitat is not only exposing these gentle birds to starvation and the loss of breeding hollows – but it is also leading to vehicle strikes, as they are forced to fly through increasingly cleared or urbanised landscapes, or forage by roadsides for crushed marri nuts or spilled wheat.

🚚 Black cockatoos are heavy birds with a large wingspan and they need time to take flight and clear cars or trucks. If you see a black cockatoo on the ground or in a low shrub by the road, *please slow down* to allow them to become airborne. And if you are planting for black cockatoos 🌿, please plant at least 3-5m away from quiet roads, or 10m away from busy roads.

We are really grateful to the volunteers, researchers and organisations that are working to protect these beautiful birds – but we urgently need all levels of government and everyone in our community to help them as well. Please see our comments, for a list of ways you can help.

It’s hatchling season for our beautiful South-Western Snake-necked Turtles 🐢!

Perth may finally have a little rain this week 🌧. Although hatchlings generally emerge from their eggs once they have eaten their yolks, they will also respond to rain-bearing low pressure systems (similarly to female nesting behaviours). If you live within 800m of a freshwater lake, you may see these tiny babies emerging from the ground and searching for their mother's waterways. If they get there safely, they will feast on tiny invertebrates like mosquito larvae 🦟 - one hatchling can eat up to 70 a day!

Every one of these precious hatchlings is important – especially now that turtle populations are suffering as a result of fox predation, off-leash dogs, outside cats, inattentive drivers or cyclists, rubbish, pollution, weeds, climate change, excessive bore water use and the destruction of their wetland habitats.

🐢 If you find a healthy hatchling (strong, active, all limbs moving well, no wounds), you can help it by keeping guard, while it makes its way to its nearest fresh water lake

🐢 If it is at risk from people, predators, cars, cyclists, fences or rubbish, you can pick it up gently and place it in fringing vegetation around the closest freshwater lake (contact us for advice, if needed)

🐢 If you ever find eggs or an injured, sick or dead turtle of any age, please call us immediately. Injured turtles should be transported in a bucket on a damp towel (not water) at around 26°C (the preferred body temperature for this species).

Female turtles lay their first batch of eggs in September and a smaller, second batch around December-January - so we will see another, smaller emergence of baby turtles in August!

Firebreaks can be life-saving for both people and wildlife – but they can also become dangerous traps, when eroded by heavy rainfall 😞 🦘.

This poor Western Grey Kangaroo joey was found seriously injured on a steep firebreak path in Greenmount National Park, last Sunday. He appeared to have been crossing the path to access vegetation, when he tripped and fell into one of the many deep ravines that seem to characterise the lower sections of these tracks.

He was spotted by a kind local man Xavier, who was out walking with his mother Jude. They realised that he was badly injured and unable to move, so they paused their walk and called us for help, quietly waiting with him until we could arrive.

When we reached the firebreak, we were concerned to see that the joey was showing signs of a spinal injury, hypothermia, dehydration and myopathy (a dangerous condition brought on by stress and exertion). We were able to gently extract him and take him straight to a 24 hour vet clinic. The vets started oxygen and analgesia and transferred him to WA Wildlife for x-rays. Unfortunately they found that he had suffered a fracture to his thoracic vertebrae, so there was no choice but to provide him with humane euthanasia. Although this was a really sad outcome for this poor joey (and his mother, who was seen nearby, before we arrived), we are grateful to his lovely rescuers Xavier and Jude and the vets, who all cared for him and worked quickly to ensure that he was at least warm and safe at the end, rather than left to suffer in the cold, or be found by a fox.

We have let the authorities know about the erosion and we hope that funds can be provided to make this area safer for our beautiful wildlife, bushwalkers - and any firefighters that may need the track, during bushfire season. We also encourage everyone to repair and maintain their own firebreaks, before winter ends.

It can sometimes be very difficult to arrange rescues for these beautiful, gentle animals - which are so vulnerable to habitat destruction, cars, fences and introduced predators. Please save the Wildcare Helpline number on your phone (9474 9055) and – if they are unavailable – please call or message your local wildlife hospital, so we can try to assist with advice or a rescue, wherever possible.

✨️ National Volunteer Week Spotlights ✨️

We hope you will enjoy meeting more of our amazing volunteers!

Allan, Ellena, Mike, Susan and Sarah volunteer across our rehabilitation, administration, fundraising and education teams. Like all of our volunteers, they have each come to us with a diverse range of skills and work experiences, which have enriched their teams and helped to support our organisation in different ways. Whether they assessing an injured quenda, updating our database so our treatment team can track patients more efficiently, booking a young child into an after-school program, helping to feed an orphaned joey or mentoring a fellow volunteer as they learn how to tube-feed a young bronzewing pigeon – they all share a kind heart and a common goal: to help us create a better world for wildlife. We really appreciate their years of dedicated service and their advocacy for our vulnerable native animals.

Thank you to everyone who has shared their story with us this week 💚! We hope you will all continue to work for wildlife, for many more years.

National Volunteer Week Spotlight 🌿

Meet Hazel - one of our senior hospital receptionists, who has been volunteering with us for over 7 years! Our hospital receptionists have an incredibly important job – they greet all of our rescuers, record each new patient’s history, provide advice on keeping wildlife safe, organise patient transfers, keep our paperwork and database updated, answer our phone and emails, mentor new volunteers…among many other tasks that support our rehabilitation team, every day.

‘I love volunteering at Kanyana. I have gained so much knowledge about wildlife – and the perils they face - over the years. I also love the fact that Kanyana is an educational facility as much as it is a hospital.

I have noticed an increase in public awareness over the years - I think due to our publications, social media campaigns, our education team and our market visits. I believe it is very important to educate and familiarise people with the animals that live around them, so they care about and help injured or sick animals.

Coming from Scotland, I have always been fascinated by the diversity of Australian wildlife. One of my favourite animals is probably the echidna 🦔 – they are so unusual!

I would like to see a total ban on second generation rat baits. As a receptionist I admit many birds and animals suffering from the effects of poisoning. Another issue that I am passionate about is the destruction of black cockatoo habitat. There needs to be more protections and for the government to consider native species before approving the clearing of our banksia and eucalyptus woodlands.

There are many extra tasks associated with Kanyana - I also crochet nests for the orphaned birds that come into care!’

We really appreciate everything that Hazel – and all of our receptionists – do for us, our patients and our community. If you have met one of our wonderful receptionists, please thank them in the comments 💚.