Is the bilby's population increasing or decreasing?

Answer 1

Male bilbies can be up to 55cm long in its body, with a tail up to 29cm long, whilst the females tend to be about half that size.
Males weigh from 1 to 2.5kg, while females weigh much less, from 800g to 1.1kg.

In imperial terms, this works out to a head-and-body length of about 19.5 inches, and a tail length of about 15.5 inches. Weight averages three pounds.

Answer 2

There used to be two species of bilby, the Greater Bilby and the Lesser Bilby. The Lesser Bilby, Macrotis luecura is believed to have become extinct some time between the 1930s and 1950s. Now, there is just the Greater Bilby, Macrotis lagotis, which is listed as "vulnerable", federally, with a population trend status "decreasing". It is listed as "endangered" in Queensland.

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Answer 3

As of 2013, the bilby's population is in decline. There is only one species of the original two remaining, the Greater bilby, and it is endangered by factors such as habitat loss, competition from introduced species and predation from introduced species. Although bilbies are kept in protective captivity in some remote places of western Queensland, feral cats have managed to decimate these populations by squeezing through damaged parts of the fence, severely compromising the captive breeding programmes.

Answer 4

The ecosystem of the bilby includes hot, dry grasslands and semi-arid spinifex areas.

Bilbies (small marsupials sometimes known as rabbit-eared bandicoots) are critically endangered, and can only be found in isolated areas of far western Queensland and the Northern Territory, and areas of the Great Sandy Desert, Pilbara and Kimberley areas of Western Australia. In Queensland, they may be seen in a protected area near Charleville, in the west.

Bilbies live in burrows in hot, dry grasslands and semi-arid spinifex areas. The burrow entrance is often positioned against a termite mound or small shrub, and a single bilby may have up to a dozen burrows that it uses either for shelter during the day, or as a quick escape route from predators.

Amazingly adaptable for their size and the threats to them, bilbies can live in sandstone ridges, gibber plains, rocky soils with little ground cover, a variety of grasslands, and acacia scrub.

Answer 5

Current estimates put the bilby's population at about 500-600.

In 2012, up to 80% of one wild bilby colony was wiped out when feral cats entered their protected enclosure after floods damaged the predator-proof fence in southwest Queensland.