TRANSCRIPT
Armed with a makeshift pole and a spray can filled with medication, conservationist Melina Budden quietly tails Hope, a mange-infected wombat, through the Australian bush.
Mange is a skin disease caused by parasitic mites that burrow into the skin of the infected mammal and can lead to secondary infections, maggots, malnutrition, renal failure, and ultimately death.
Melina Budden says it's one of the biggest causes of death in wombats and could decimate the species if allowed to spread unchecked across the country, says Melina Budden.
“A very slow and painful death. So it will, in 100% of cases, wipe them out. Especially if you let it run rampant, but obviously there’s community groups all across the country trying to do their best, but it’s not enough.”
One of those groups is the Blue Mountains Wombat Conservation Group, which Ms Budden founded in 2020.
The group, now has between 20 and 40 volunteers, and treats up to 200 wombats at a time.
The reliance on voluntary community groups and the lack of long-term solutions raises questions about the sustainability of current efforts and underlines the need for more research and funding.
The New South Wales government has allocated 2.8 million dollars for 2022-2024 as part of their Curb Wombat Mange Program.
Research being funded by the program includes developing methods to identify mange in wombats and evaluating the efficacy of treatment.
However, Ms Budden questions whether these funds are being directed towards the right research.
“It’s a biosecurity issue. Look, at the end of the day, mange affects most mammals within Australia and it also affects the agricultural industry. Like it affects cows, it affects horses, it affects the farm dogs, the family dog. And I guess the biggest issues with this situation is that as the environment gets worse, it affects people more and as it affects more people, the more they don’t want to help us because everyone becomes a little bit selfish I guess during environment events where they need to look after their house or their kids or their family.”
Speaking to SBS News last year, Kristie Newton from the Wildlife Information Rescue and Education Service known as WIRES says the disease spreads quickly and nearly 40 per cent of wombat related calls they receive relate to wombats with mange.
“Sarcoptic mange affects more than 100 million species around the world, including humans, when we get it we actually call it scabies but it's not too bad and ask we just treat it with a cream. Unfortunately, in wombats, the parasitic mite borrows under their skin and lays eggs. Now, when the eggs hatch, it actually causes their skin to get really thick and crack open. They get very, very itchy, it's very painful. And when it gets worse, they actually lose their ability to see and hear and eventually if it's left untreated, they will die of this disease.”
Marie Wynan, the director of the Wombat protection Society of Australia, told SBS climate change and loss of habitat are contributory factors to the spread of mange among the wombat population.
“Often, they are forced to get closer together due to habitat destruction and smaller lots being broken up. So, they’ve just got smaller areas to live on and becoming more concentrated. And also, of course, climate change, all these floods and fires. They have to move to a different area and they have to congregate like closer together. So that's a big thing of reason why it can spread so rapidly across the whole population.”
To help the wombats, the volunteers rely on two forms of treatment: direct dosage and a self-built flap system.
Melina Budden again:
“We basically put this in the entry to their burrow, make sure they can’t get out either side, we put a sticker on here to warn the public that this is wombat medication and not to touch. We then put the medication in this lid which is just either a Vegemite (food spread) lid or a peanut butter lid, as I said you can use other things like medicine lids, medicine things for kids, we just put the meds into there and what happens is the wombat either comes out or in and it’ll start on the back of their neck and go all the way down their back and we do this once a week where we top up the medication, so once a week they get their 20 mls of medication so they start to feel better.”
Tracking down and treating wild animals is a challenging and labour-intensive process - and for Ms Budden it feels like a race against time as other issues threaten to taken prominence - and funding - away from the wombats.
“And I guess the biggest issues with this situation is that as the environment gets worse, it affects people more and as it affects more people, the more they don’t want to help us because everyone becomes a little bit selfish I guess during environment events where they need to look after their house or their kids or their family. And I mean rightly so I guess.”
Additionally, the treatment does not provide long-term immunity to the disease, which means that often, the same wombats are being treated each year.
This is Hope’s third year being treated.
However, she has not been spotted in a few weeks and questions remain about her wellbeing after another mange infection.
But 2024 has been the group’s busiest year yet, and so Ms Budden continues to make the two-hour journey from Sydney as often as possible to assist.
“Originally I thought we were making a difference, but now I feel like we’re just on a merry-go-round. You can’t stop, you can’t just let something die a very slow and painful death and do nothing. It's like everybody just needs to start realising, like they keep saying it’s a welfare issue, it’s a conservation issue. It’s a scientific conservation issue that needs assistance. So we’ve got two choices here. We either keep doing what we’re doing and essentially drive ourselves into the ground because we’re all doing this for free, or we stop and then it’s like, well they die. Neither is the best answer.”
