\n<\/p>\n
Editor\u2019s Note: Call to Earth is a CNN editorial series committed to reporting on the environmental challenges facing our planet, together with the solutions. Rolex\u2019s Perpetual Planet initiative<\/a> has partnered with CNN to drive awareness and education around key sustainability issues and to inspire positive action.<\/p>\n The brush-tailed bettong looks like a miniature kangaroo and, similarly, has a pouch where it keeps its young. But don\u2019t be fooled, this small marsupial is not as adorable as it looks. When threatened by a predator, the bettong will eject its tiny joey<\/a> from its pouch and bounce off in a different direction to evade capture.<\/p>\n Sacrificing one\u2019s own young might seem brutal, but it\u2019s an essential survival strategy for a species that, until recently, was extinct in South Australia\u2019s Yorke Peninsula<\/a>.<\/p>\n Brush-tailed bettongs (also known as woylies) once inhabited more than 60% of mainland Australia<\/a>. However, the European colonization of the country brought with it predatory feral cats and foxes, and the destruction of much of the animal\u2019s native grassland and woodland habitats.<\/p>\n Between 1999 and 2010, the species\u2019 population size declined by 90%<\/a> \u2013 a drastic drop that some research suggests may have resulted from the spread of blood parasites<\/a>, alongside other factors. Today, the brush-tailed bettong is limited to just a few islands and isolated mainland pockets in Southwestern Australia: a mere 1% of its former range.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are on a mission, if you like, to bring back some of these native species that have gone missing in our landscape since European colonization,\u201d says Derek Sandow, project manager of Marna Banggara, an initiative dedicated to restoring some of the Yorke Peninsula\u2019s historic ecological diversity.<\/p>\n Formerly known as the \u201cGreat Southern Ark,\u201d the project, which was launched in 2019 by the Northern and Yorke Landscape Board, was renamed to honor the region\u2019s native Narungga people, who are heavily involved with the initiative.<\/p>\n \u201cMarna in our language means good, prosperous, healthy, and Banggara means country,\u201d says Garry Goldsmith, a member of the Narungga community who works on the project.<\/p>\nMarna Banggara<\/h3>\n