Mammals

Mammal – Marsupial, Family Dasyuridae
The Eastern Quoll, also known by the early settlers as a native cat, has striking white-spotted black or brown fur. The lack of spots on the tail helps distinguish them from their larger relative the Tiger Quoll (or Spotted-tail Quoll). Males weigh about 1.3kg, with a head and body length of 33cm, while females weigh 900g with a slightly shorter head and body length of 31.5cm.

Conservation Status:
Eastern Quolls have completely disappeared from their south eastern range on the mainland, classed as “Extinct” since the 1950s, and are now only found in Tasmania. Once quolls were so numerous they were considered as vermin and a halfpenny bounty was paid for them. During the early 1900s a major epidemic struck that proved fatal for about 90% of the Eastern Quoll population, along with a host of other carnivorous marsupials. It is thought this disease was Toxoplasmosis, which was carried by domesticated cats when settlers brought them to Australia. The remaining quolls then suffered from a dramatic decline of their basalt grassland habitat, which used to cover almost a third of Victoria. Less than 0.01% of this critically endangered ecosystem is left today. Predation and competition from feral cats and foxes, along with changes in fire regimes, were further nails in the coffin for quolls. Mt Rothwell has the most successful breeding program of Eastern Quolls in Australia and 31 animals were shifted from Warrawong to Mt Rothwell in December 2002. The first breeding season at Mt Rothwell in 2003 produced over 50 young.

Habitat, Diet & Breeding:
Iconic animals of the basalt grasslands, Eastern Quolls were often seen sunning themselves on rock piles and fence posts. They also lived in open woodland and dry forest habitats, with males occupying home ranges of around 44ha and females 35ha. Population densities are dependent upon the availability of food as they are opportunistic carnivores. While their diet mainly consists of insects, they also take small vertebrates and kill their prey with a crushing bite to the back of the skull. Eggs from bird nests, grasses, seeds, fruits and carrion are also eaten.
Mating occurs from mid-May until early June, and after a gestation period of 20-24 days, a female can give birth to up to 30 rice grain-sized babies. As she only has six nipples in her pouch, the first six young to attach are the ones to survive. They remain attached to the teat until mid August when they weigh about 200g and are too bulky for the pouch. Weaning is complete by about 112 days, timed so the young become independent when there is a flush of spring insects. They become sexually mature by the next breeding season and have an average lifespan of around 3 to 4 years. Mt Rothwell has now ceased it’s captive breeding program and continues to monitor the progress of this flourishing population of re-introduced quolls. As the next year or 2 unfolds the entire population of Eastern Quoll at Mt Rothwell will be %100 wild born as the older captive bred animals begin to reach old age and die off. This is a remarkable achievement, an entire population of wild born, free living Eastern Quoll back on mainland Australia.

Interesting Facts:
Eastern Quolls construct dens in fallen logs, piles of rocks or dense tangled vegetation and they may consist of a number of grass-lined chambers. John Wamsley, the founder of Earth Sanctuaries, first proposed the idea that Eastern Quolls become a trendy new pet, pointing to the fact that this animal is very easily domesticated. There is in fact little difference between hand reared Quolls and domestic cats, in behaviour, diet, etc, although the quoll is much shorter lived. An interesting point to consider is that we all can walk into a pet store and buy rabbits, dogs, cats etc with no licence, no follow up on where we take them, put them or release them and yet we have our very own native species driven to extinction on the mainland by the presence of these very same ‘pet shop’ purchases, but we are not allowed to keep them as pets. The question to consider, is a domestic population of Eastern Quolls on the mainland better than no population at all?