The CSIRO will publish a peer-reviewed study on the number of Koalas currently alive in Australia. They've used new study methods such a thermal drone technology and audio recorders, which have "revealed koalas to be more widespread in some habitats than previously known". These technologies have given scientists a "much more spatially comprehensive and sensitive survey data".

The result? Well the CSIRO have found that there are vastly greater numbers of what John Brown, the Hawke government minister for the environment, described as "flea-ridden, piddling, stinking, scratching, rotten little things". In 2023 the CSIRO thought there were between 287,830 and 628,010 koalas in Australia. Now their figures are 729,000 to 918,000.

900, 000!! So much for going extinct.

Now you'd normally think that the koala industry would be thrilled to find that their favourite critter wasn't going the way of the Dodo.

But alas no. This is a disaster for them. Entire careers have been based around saving koalas from extinction. Fortunes made. Institutions funding raising like there's no tomorrow, which is what they tell a gullible public. And now!....poof, all gone.

Whatismore, all those anti-loggers who use the alleged extinction of the koala as an excuse to shut down whole areas of forest to the wood harvesting industry, have lost all their legal points overnight.

But fear not. The koala industry doesn't give up that easily. Mere facts aren't enough to stop these charlatans from keeping the scam going. They've already announced that they have no intention of accepting the science and will stick by their claims that there are less that 100,000 of the critters in Australia.

It'll be interesting to see if the CSIRO sticks to its guns or if the politics of the issue will force them to backdown and go along to get along as they've done with the climate debate

The obsession with wild animals most people will never see off a TV screen is one of their more harmless idiosyncrasies; not so harmless is the serious effect mad activists and paid “experts” have on Australia’s economy and growth.

Just wait until they find ‘endangered’ species nobody has heard of when it comes to mining rare earths/minerals for America as per the deal our supporter of environmentalism and aboactivism, Albanese, signed up for with Donald Trump.

Yes, and the GBR is at great risk of being destroyed by global warming, yet it keeps growing bigger.

I'm all for preserving koala habitats, especially if that means stopping the wind and solar scam.

That number isn't even in the peer-reviewed study yet, mhaze.

//900,000!! So much for going extinct.//

It's from media coverage of preliminary modelling, and the scientists involved have been very clear that the increase is mostly due to improved detection methods.

The official 2024 report from the CSIRO-led National Koala Monitoring Program puts the estimate at 224,000 to 524,000, and explicitly says it cannot be compared to previous years because of the difference in methodology.

//Entire careers have been based around saving koalas… poof, all gone.//

What's "gone"?

Koalas are still listed as endangered in several states. Habitat destruction, disease, and climate stress haven't magically disappeared. The scientists themselves also warn that the data is still patchy and the confidence intervals are wide.

//Anti-loggers have lost all their legal points overnight.//

As if population size is the only metric that matters. It's not.

What matters is whether their habitats are connected and how stable those local populations are. A big national number doesn't erase local collapses.

//The koala industry doesn't give up that easily… Mere facts aren't enough to stop these charlatans…//

This is projection.

The only side here that has historically distorted numbers for political convenience is the logging industry. The conservation community has pushed for better data - and now that better data has arrived, they're not ignoring it. They're contextualising it. Unlike you, they've actually read the report.

//Will CSIRO stick to its guns, or will politics force them to back down like with climate?//

So, when their data supposedly proves your point, they're potential heroes - but if they don't bend to your worldview next time, they're compromised again? You can't have it both ways.

CSIRO's climate research is globally respected, and now that their koala research shows a larger-than-expected population, you're willing to entertain the findings only because you think it undermines conservation. That's just cherry-picking dressed up as scepticism.

The report is nuanced. You are not. And if you really cared about the truth, you'd be quoting from it - not inventing villains.

Wind and solar is a scam, the biggest scam of all times is the coalition believing in nukes and look at what it is doing to them.
They can not even put one together in England still no finish date. but that is what England has to do because they do not have the intensity of sunshine AU does and it's free. Our solar will be exported to places that do not have any room for their own solar.
How can anybody whinge and whine about solar. Labor has the foresight to come up with these things. The coalition if it still exists only want nukes that do not exist.

How can anybody whinge and whine about solar.
doog,
Since Koalas can't speak or write it is those who can think who step up to the task of saving the environment from alternative energy !

Humans should not be concerned about juggling other species, but about reducing their own numbers.

Doing so, human energy consumption will drop as well and no longer be a source of contention.

Not doing so, something or the other that humans do would inevitably harm the environment.

Maybe we should move to label the species an official terrorist organisation.
Those terrorist koalas, how dare they prevent urban sprawl for all our lovely new immigrants.
Hold them without charge, with no access to legal counsel or due process.
Better still, they should be fined, imprisoned and shot, like vermin.
Eradicate them, by all means necessary.
Just bulldoze their homes already, after all the traditional inhabitants don't matter.
Poison their water, destroy their food sources and starve them out.

"That number isn't even in the peer-reviewed study yet, mhaze."

Oh really? Perhaps that's why I said they "will publish a peer-reviewed study". Future tense. Still its good to see that you're taking your talking points from the koala industry who are also saying the facts don't exist until they're published.

And of coarse, you'll also go with all their other claims to keep the funds rolling in. All of a sudden, them going extinct isn't the main story. Its all about nuance and other things that the data doesn't support. And keep donating....

"the scientists involved have been very clear that the increase is mostly due to improved detection methods."

Oh well perhaps I should have said that. Oh wait... I did. Still if you cant argue with my views, make up other views and tell me I'm wrong to hold views I don't hold. Standard JD.

The fact is the critter was never in danger. It was a scam based on minimal data, and they tried to keep the data vague.

"Koalas are still listed as endangered in several states."

This was an Australia-wide survey. Tell me more about reading the report.

Being in small numbers in some places, isn't the same as being endangered. I hear that the Emperor Penguin is endangered in Jamaica. Oh the humanity

When Europeans first arrived in Sydney there were no koalas in the region. Indeed the first recorded sighting occurred some 10 years after settlement in a region around Jarvis Bay. The critters were scarce and had a limited range limited to the east coast and southern Victoria. (In antiquity they existed in the west and South Australia but were hunted to extinction by the natives - although its probably illegal to say that these days since we are required to believe the natives lived in serene harmony with nature).
.

Famously they are very finicky about their food sources. Luckily for the koala, the trees they like to eat were also favoured by Europeans who proceeded to expand the range of the various eucalypts that koalas feed on and therefore the range of the critters.

So come the late 20th century, when koalas are prevalent up and down the east coast, and even further afield, and the assumption among the activists became that it was always thus, and, since they weren't quite as prevalent in some places as others, they must be dying out due to those dastardly Europeans.

And now? Now we know that far from dying out they are thriving. Oh the humanity.

Oh the humanity.
maze,
If only we could refer to at least half the population as such !

The 'humanising' of animals indicates a warped society. The most stupid example currently is the moronic siding with sharks against fellow humans who have been killed by the horrible things.

I'm not, mhaze.

//...it's good to see you're taking your talking points from the koala industry…//

I'm taking them from the actual CSIRO/NKMP technical report, which you clearly haven't read. You might have said the study is forthcoming, but you then cited its unpublished high-end figure as if it were settled fact, while mocking others for supposedly ignoring "the science".

You can't use it as a cudgel and then claim immunity from critique because it's "not published yet."

//All of a sudden, them going extinct isn't the main story. It's all about nuance…//

No, that's always been the case.

Koala population health is about distribution, genetic diversity, habitat quality, and local collapses - all of which you ignore in favour of a gotcha narrative.

//Being in small numbers in some places, isn't the same as being endangered.//

Except that's what "endangered" means.

A species is listed as endangered when it's facing a very high risk of extinction in the wild due to population fragmentation, decline in area of occupancy, or habitat loss. That's exactly the case in QLD, NSW and the ACT. The listing is region-specific because the threats are localised.

//Now we know they're thriving.//

No, now we have a modelled baseline that suggests the total population may be higher than previous estimates - largely due to expanded survey area, better technology, and improved spatial modelling. It says nothing about population trends, and explicitly cautions against your interpretation of it.

//Europeans expanded their range…//

This is historical sleight of hand.

Our introducing of eucalypts to new areas, and the geographical expansion of Koalas, isn't automatically a positive. Cherry-picking a moment in colonial history to imply that we've done them a favour is not the slam dunk you think it is.

Your argument hinges on the idea that conservation was built on a lie, but the only lie is yours: that higher population numbers invalidate all environmental concerns, that listing status is political theatre, and that people who care about wildlife must be part of some grubby industry.

You're not defending truth. You're trying to justify never having cared.

Quite a bout of hysteria there JD.

I'm just talking about koalas. Not about conservation in general. Not about saving truly threatened species. Just about the way some have used the false claims about an alleged cuddly critter to line their own pockets and/or advanced their utterly unrelated goals.

But there's this need to defend every battlement, every green shibboleth. Anything that looks even vaguely like an attack on anything vaguely green must be treated as heresy and beaten into submission.

That's why I wondered if the CSIRO has the balls to stand up to the hysteria coming its way over this.

But how about you confine yourself to the koala and celebrate the FACT that is no longer going the way of the Dodo.

Cute koalas are not as important as ugly old bats, which as one disinterested in all animals that aren't edible, has read do more for the fertilisation of our food crops than even birds and bees.

It might sound a bit religious, but animals were created to serve humans. If they don't do that, they are not needed.

They are particularly not needed on Kangaroo Island, where they are not native, but were introduced from Queensland by some wankerdoodle. They are disliked by sensible Islanders, and there are far too many of them. Every now and again there are calls for culling.

40%-90% of the little buggers have chlamidyia.

mhaze,

There's no hysteria here - in fact, I felt quite calm when typing that one up - just a refusal to let you smuggle lazy narratives past unchallenged.

You say you're "just talking about koalas", but what you're actually doing is attacking scientists and conservationists, accusing them of fraud and ideological manipulation - then playing the victim when someone pushes back. If you want a civil, koala-only conversation, maybe don't open with "scam," "charlatans," and "fundraising racket."

You now claim you're not attacking conservation generally - just the "false claims" about koalas. But the only thing shown false here is your assumption that a higher population estimate equals thriving species. The CSIRO didn't say that. In fact, they warned against that very interpretation. You don't cite their caution because it doesn't fit the gotcha narrative.

//Celebrate the FACT that [the koala] is no longer going the way of the Dodo.//

But again, the scientists didn't say that. They released a baseline model with wide confidence intervals, noted improved methods as the key driver of higher estimates, and reaffirmed the endangered listing in QLD, NSW, and ACT. They warned against treating these numbers as trend data or justification for complacency.

You ignore all that. Why? Because your argument only works if you erase complexity. You're not "just talking about koalas." You're using them as a rhetorical battering ram - to delegitimise conservation work more broadly, portray scientists as agenda-driven grifters, and cast yourself as bravely "calling out" green dogma.

This isn't about battlements or shibboleths. It's about intellectual honesty.

You're trying to shift the burden now: "Why not just celebrate the new numbers?" Easy - because pretending that those numbers tell the full story is misleading. The CSIRO doesn't pretend that, and neither should you.

If you want a real discussion about the koala's status, let's have it. But don't expect to throw rhetorical grenades and then complain when people respond with more than a shrug.

Again JD, you read things I don't say and then complain that I said things you thought I said but never said.

There are now, we know, many hundreds of thousands of koalas on the east coast. And many hundreds of thousands more than even the CSITRO previously thought existed. That, to my mind, means they are thriving. Nowhere did I say they are increasing in number or that the new discoveries represent a trend. That's just another thing you made up to try to turn the argument into something you could deal with....and failed yet again.

Also nowhere did I say that the scientists were in on the fake claims about the koala numbers. That was all down to activists who made careers and fortunes out of claiming the creature was all but gone when the opposite was true. And now they are panicking just as you're panicking trying to claim that a creature that numbers in the hundreds of thousands, thanks to humans, is somehow endangered.

But hang in there. There's every chance the CSIRO will be battered into submission on this and their research withdrawn.

mhaze,

You keep trying to reposition yourself after the fact - rewriting your original tone, intent, and wording once called out.

You opened with sarcasm, conspiracy innuendo, and declared "the critter was never in danger" and that conservationists were part of a scam. Now you claim you never said koalas are increasing, never blamed scientists, and never implied anything broader than "just talking about koalas." That's convenient, but not honest.

You now insist that you consider hundreds of thousands of koalas to mean they're "thriving," even though:

- You previously mocked those who waited for peer-reviewed confirmation as if it was cowardice.

- You ignored that the scientists explicitly warned the estimate is a baseline, not a trend, and that population health includes more than a raw count.

- You disregarded the fact that the endangered listing is based on well-documented regional declines - particularly in QLD, NSW, and ACT - not just aggregate numbers.

You now say you never accused scientists - only "activists" who lined their pockets. Yet you questioned whether CSIRO would have "the balls" to resist pressure and "go along like they did with the climate debate". That's not subtle. You clearly cast doubt on scientific independence, then backpedal when challenged.

Your fallback - that you were "just celebrating good news" - is undermined by your gleeful swipes at conservation work, scientists, and anyone who didn't immediately declare "crisis over." You didn't come here to celebrate, you came here to declare victory in a culture war.

If you'd simply said, "These numbers suggest we may have underestimated the population, and that's worth updating our approach," you'd be in good faith territory. But instead, you weaponised the headline to paint years of science and policy as fraudulent - then cry misrepresentation when someone points it out.

You don't get to swing a rhetorical hammer and then act surprised when someone calls it what it is.

"the biggest scam of all times is the coalition believing in nukes"

Currently there are 438 operating nuclear reactors, 70 under construction, 116 planned and 320 proposed. All operating reactors produce dispatchable power. In contrast, how many dispatchable wind and solar generation systems are in existence? Zero, as they all require 100% backup from gas, coal, hydro or nuclear.

That might be why north of ten billion in taxpayer dollars are going yearly to the scammers, yet power bills are over $1000 a year higher than cult leader Albo predicted.

And your Sun Cable fantasy would cost around $100 billion and makes even less sense than building a 3 GW power station on the Gold Coast then sending the power to Perth via HVDC transmission lines. Pure idiocy. Singapore is moving fast toward developing nuclear power: They want energy security and cheap, reliable power, not an economy destroying fantasy.

I'm sure the Koalas can't wait to have all their gum trees bulldozed and replaced with solar farms and wind turbines.

Fester,

It's remarkable how many talking points you've recycled there, and still without questioning the assumptions behind and of them.

//All operating reactors produce dispatchable power. In contrast ... wind and solar ... Zero...//

Sounds compelling and damning, but it's a misunderstanding of how modern grids actually work.

Nuclear is dispatchable in the baseload sense, but it's not flexible. It ramps slowly and can't respond to peak demand like batteries or fast-start gas can. Solar and wind don't need "100% backup".

//Yet power bills are over $1000 a year higher than cult leader Albo predicted.//

Current prices are largely due to gas prices and network costs. But wholesale prices - which the $275 saving was based on - are falling fast. The lag in retail prices is normal, not some conspiracy. It's how market pass-through works.

//Your Sun Cable fantasy would cost around $100 billion…//

The project stalled not because it was "fantasy," but because of a boardroom split between Forrest and Cannon-Brookes. Sun Cable was never about beaming power from Darwin to Perth - it was a Darwin-Singapore link using ultra-cheap NT solar.

And HVDC? We already use it - Basslink, QNI, EnergyConnect - it's not some wild idea. It's how every modern grid bridges distance and smooths volatility.

//Singapore is moving fast toward developing nuclear power…//

Yes, if by "fast" you mean "cautiously," and by "moving toward" you mean "dabbling in." They're forced to because they've got no space for renewables.

So, you're really scraping the barrel if Singapore is your benchmark for a national energy plan. Nuclear might be part of the mix one day, but it's not the silver bullet you're pretending it is. Just ask the UK.

//I'm sure the Koalas can't wait to have all their gum trees bulldozed...//

Koalas face bigger threats from land clearing for agriculture, car strikes, and disease - making it obvious that you don't actually care about them at all beyond the role their cuddliness can play in your culture war.

Solar farms often coexist with grazing, and wind farms occupy a tiny fraction of their footprint.

JD asserts..."Now you claim you never said koalas are increasing, never blamed scientists, and never implied anything broader than "just talking about koalas." That's convenient, but not honest."

Not honest? Oh well, the logical thing would then be to show where I indeed said koala numbers are increasing, indeed blamed scientists for the scam, indeed made broader claims. But JD doesn't do any of that. Not a jot.

Just the accusation and then scurrying away to make further false accusations.

Given that JD seems to think that having more koalas than we thought, is a bad thing, he'll be distressed to learn:

* a new population of the critter have been found around the Snowy Mountains.... http://aboutregional.com.au/koala-cluster-discovered-in-snowy-mountains-20-years-after-bushfire/490785/

* "A survey shows that Koala populations are bouncing back in areas between Morton and Bungonia"

* koalas on French Island (where they are an introduced pest) are doing so well that they are destroying the island's trees. And now there's talk of a cull!! Culling an endangered species?? The usual suspects won't get the irony there.

mhaze,

The irony here is that you're demanding quotes for claims you did make - just now recast with a fresh coat of plausible deniability.

You absolutely claimed the population was underestimated because "the critter was never in danger," that the extinction narrative was a "scam," and that it was "all gone" for the fundraising efforts of activists.

You asked whether CSIRO would have "the balls" to resist pressure - and suggested they'd back down just like they supposedly did "with the climate debate." That's more than enough to imply scientific capture or complicity, even if you avoided saying it outright.

You're walking a careful line - smearing scientists by implication, then retreating to "I never technically said that" when pressed. It's a common rhetorical game, but it doesn't land here.

As for your "good news" points? No one disputes that koalas remain locally abundant in some areas. That's been acknowledged repeatedly in the very research you keep ignoring. French Island koalas are introduced, unmanaged, and breeding without predators - which is why they're overpopulated.

That doesn't contradict regional endangerment elsewhere. It highlights the complexity you keep flattening into talking points.

Your Snowy Mountains link refers to a small population cluster detected via acoustic recorders - the very kind of improved method CSIRO says is responsible for the higher national estimate. If anything, it reinforces the point: better tech and survey coverage reveal more, but that doesn't erase existing threats.

What you consistently refuse to address is the CSIRO's own caution: that these population estimates are not trend data, and that localised declines, fragmentation, and habitat degradation remain real threats - especially in QLD, NSW, and ACT.

You're not celebrating good news. You're exploiting it to dismiss conservation science and paint years of concern as a hoax, while pretending to be misquoted when the implications are called out.

If you're confident in your position, own it. But don't build the bonfire and then act offended when someone points out that you're holding a match.

Try again.

Personally I think we should build massive oversupply, and when producing more than needed run bitcoin miners with the excess power.

This is getting boring. I get that you're trying to find a way out of the corner you've painted yourself into, but I don't feel the need to hang around while you do it.

But just to show how much you distort....

"You absolutely claimed the population was underestimated because "the critter was never in danger,"

Yes I did. But that's not the same, not even close, to saying the population is growing. I never said that but you erroneously claimed I had and never retracted. If I count the coins in my wallet and find I've got 80c but then later find a 5c coin hiding in the creases, it doesn't mean the money is increasing or that I think its growing. That'd be a dumb conclusion which it takes a special type of mind to assert

mhaze,

You're not bored, you're just out of room to manoeuvre. You built an argument on sweeping claims, and now that you're being held to them, you're trying to shrink them into something more defensible.

No one said you explicitly claimed koala populations are growing. What I pointed out - accurately - is that you repeatedly used the newly modelled higher numbers as proof that koalas are "thriving," "never in danger," and that the extinction narrative was a "scam." You even mocked people who didn't "celebrate the FACT" [your emphasis] that they were allegedly "no longer going the way of the Dodo."

That's not a neutral observation. It's an interpretation. And your interpretation - that these numbers vindicate years of dismissal and discredit conservation concerns - is what I've been responding to.

Your wallet analogy is cute but irrelevant. CSIRO didn't just find "a 5c coin hiding in the creases," they built a new wallet, widened the search area, and used better lighting. And they said clearly that:

- The new estimate is a baseline, not a trend
- The jump is largely due to improved methods, not sudden repopulation
- Endangered status remains in QLD, NSW, and ACT due to documented regional decline, fragmentation, and habitat threats

You've consistently dodged that part - because it undercuts your whole "hoax" narrative. Instead, you talk in absolutes: "the critter was never in danger," "the opposite was true," "they're thriving," and so on.

When those statements get challenged with nuance, you act like you're being misquoted - and now, predictably, claim it's "boring" to be held to your words.

You can keep shifting definitions to keep the spotlight off the flaws in your logic, but it's not working. You took a scientific update and turned it into an ideological bludgeon - and now you're annoyed that someone's still here to hold the mirror up.

Walk away if you like. The record stands.

You said above that I was dishonest to "claim [I] never said koalas are increasing,"

Now you admit I never said it.

That's as close to an apology as I'm likely to get and I guess I'll take it.

You're welcome to take whatever comfort you need, mahze.

But for the record, I never accused you of explicitly saying "koala numbers are increasing." I said you treated the revised estimate as proof they’re "thriving" and "never in danger," while ignoring the CSIRO’s clear warnings about what the data does and doesn’t mean.

That remains accurate, and you haven’t touched it - let alone refuted it.

So if your takeaway from all this is that you successfully defended a single misread inference while leaving the rest of your position in tatters, then yes - by all means, take the win.

You said above that I was dishonest to "claim [I] never said koalas are increasing," as much as you'd like to pretend otherwise.

I hope a drop bear drops on mhazes head.

AC,

You seem to believe in so many things that are fables.

Well mhaze, a drop bear IS a fabled creature
- Something we frighten the female tourists with.