Aussie Wildlife Show

We caught up with biologist Professor Chris Daniels from the University of South Australia to talk about his natural history book 'Adelaide, Nature of a City', and we discuss his new role as director of Cleland Wildlife Park. Click here to purchase Professor Daniels Book.

In this episode we learn about some threatened Aussies such as Western Pygmy Possums (see image) and Southern Brown Bandicoots, as well as wombats, Antechinus and other native mammals.   We chat about some of the research Dr. Sparrow conducts to help protect these animals and their environment as part of her role as a wildlife ecologist with the Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges Natural Resources Management Board. 

Come for a tour of some of the wildlife of Borneo with Steve and Adrian. We see wild orangutans, crocodiles and birds along the Kinabatangan River, take a wonder through Gomantong Caves, spot-light for nocturnal animals and visit some wildlife rehabilitation centres in Sepilok. Hey guys, click here to check out some footage from our recent trip to Borneo to accompany our latest episode of the show.      

Steve and Adrian headed off to Borneo earlier this year to get some wildlife-spotting tips from the tour guide that David Attenborough calls on when he goes to Borneo. John Nair Rajan is an officer in the Wildlife Rescue Unit of the Sabah Wildlife Department and a multiple recipient of the 'Best Tour Guide' from the Sabah Tourism Awards. This is the first of the interviews we did while we were exploring the forests of Borneo during April 2018. You can contact John on his Facebook page to organise your Borneo adventure.

When he's not swimming for Australia, Olympic gold medallist Kyle Chalmers loves hanging out with his private collection of reptiles. We had a great discussion about his growing reptile collection and the unique forms of blue-tongue skinks that he works with. Kyle shares with us his passion, or obsession, for the captive husbandry of his scaly companions and reveals his future plans within the hobby.   You can check out Kyle's page and see his awesome animals at kc_critters    

Grow a backbone!? So is it true that behind every good vertebrate is a greater invertebrate? What does a snail racing, spider cuddling, mantid mating environmental educator have to say about the importance of these little spineless critters to our complex biodiversity? We unfold some of the magic and often hidden world of invertebrates with Kristen Messenger owner/operator of Bugs n Slugs. Kristen travels around Australia as an environmental educator accompanied by a host of spiders, insects, snails, slugs and other critters.

We sat down for a chat with our good friend Dr John Walmsley at his bush block in the Adelaide Hills. He is known colloquially as the 'cat hat man' because he wore a hat made from the pelt of feral cat to a tourism awards ceremony, the ensuing controversy led to the laws changing to allow feral cats to be legally killed is Australia. He set up wildlife sanctuaries across Australia to exclude feral animals and to reintroduce locally extinct and threatened species. We talk to John about the early days of his conservation endeavours as well as his firsthand experience working with such animals as platypus, bilbies and numbats. John turned 80 in 2018 and is still active in the realm of conservation and habitat restoration.   He was the Prime Minister's Environmentalist of the Year in 2000.

With the climate warming will the Earth again be inundated with giant reptiles or are we about to be thrust into another ice age?  On this episode we talk to Dr. Aaron Camens about how the Earth's ever changing climate can affect the world's fauna, as well as discusing some of the amazing mega fauna that once roamed across Australia.  

ARE THEY OUT THERE??? Officially recognised as extinct we talk to Neil Waters about the consistent sighting of Thylacines (AKA marsupial tigers) still occurring to this day all over mainland Australia and Tasmania. Visit the Thylacine Awareness Group's Facebook page and checkout Tassie Tiger Lodge.  Click here to purchase Neil's DVD, Living the Thylacine Dream.   

Counting koalas, tracking pet cats, community wildlife surveys and goanna watch. Learn how YOU can make valuable contributions to scientific research, possibly discovering a new species or even a new astronomical object . We discuss some of the citizen science projects recently undertaken by the University of South Australia. Check out the Discovery Circle Website or the Australian Citizen Science Project Finder to get involved!