Wadderin Sanctuary facts for kids
Wadderin Sanctuary is a special place in Western Australia. It's a nature project that helps protect amazing animals. This sanctuary is about 290 kilometers (180 miles) east of Perth, near the town of Narembeen.
What makes Wadderin Sanctuary so unique? It has a big fence all around it! This fence was finished in 2008. It keeps out animals like foxes and feral cats. These animals can be very harmful to native Australian wildlife. By keeping them out, Wadderin helps bring back animals that used to live in this area but are now rare or even gone from the wild. Some of these animals are even considered endangered across Australia.
Wadderin is also special because a local community group manages it. This group includes farmers and people from the town. They work together to protect nature.
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What is Wadderin Sanctuary Like?
Wadderin Sanctuary covers an area of 427 hectares (about 1,055 acres). It has big granite rocks and areas of woodland, shrubland, and mallee trees. It's mostly surrounded by farms.
This area is also a water reserve. This means it helps collect and store water. There are old walls on the granite rocks that guide rainwater into channels. This water then flows into a large dam inside the sanctuary. It's amazing that much of this water system was built in the 1920s and still works today!
In 2004, the local community group got permission to manage Wadderin. Their goal was to protect nature and maybe even offer eco-tourism in the future. Building the special fence started in 2006 and finished in 2008. The Narembeen area gets about 332 millimeters (13 inches) of rain each year, mostly from May to September.
Why Wadderin Sanctuary is Important for Australia
Wadderin Sanctuary is one of only seventeen fenced sanctuaries in Australia. These "havens" are built to protect wild populations of threatened mammals. They keep out foxes and feral cats, which are big threats to many Australian mammals and birds that nest on the ground.
Together, these sanctuaries protect about 49 groups of 27 different types of mammals. Wadderin helps protect three of these species: the red-tailed phascogale, the woylie, and the banded hare-wallaby. These sanctuaries come in different sizes. Wadderin is a bit larger than the average size for these special havens.
Amazing Animals of Wadderin Sanctuary
Before the fence was built, only a few native mammals lived in Wadderin. These included the echidna, western grey kangaroo, and euro. But there were also introduced animals like foxes, feral cats, rabbits, house mice, and black rats.
Long ago, the eastern wheatbelt area had many more native animals. A farmer named Bruce Leake wrote about them in the late 1800s. These included possums, phascogales, tammars, brush wallabies, rock-wallabies, nailtail wallabies, banded hare-wallabies, rufous hare-wallabies, woylies, boodies, pig-footed bandicoots, dalgites, numbats, and chuditch. Sadly, most of these animals disappeared. Scientists now know that foxes and feral cats caused much of this loss.
Since 2009, eight species have been brought back to Wadderin Sanctuary. Here are some of them:
| Common name | Scientific name | Category |
|---|---|---|
| Brushtail possum | Trichosurus vulpecula | |
| Red-tailed phascogale | Phascogale calura | Endangered |
| Brush-tailed bettong (woylie) | Bettongia penicillata | Endangered |
| Banded hare-wallaby | Lagostrophus fasciatus | Vulnerable |
| Western brush wallaby | Macropus irma | |
| Southern brown bandicoot (quenda) | Isoodon obesulus | |
| Malleefowl | Leipoa ocellata | Vulnerable |
| Bush stone-curlew | Burhinus grallarius |
"Endangered" means a species is at very high risk of disappearing forever. "Vulnerable" means it's at high risk.
There are also plans to bring back the black-footed rock-wallaby, which is also a vulnerable species.
Scientists and volunteers regularly check on the reintroduced animals like woylies and quendas. This helps them make sure the animals are doing well in their new home.
The sanctuary is also home to 53 different kinds of birds. You can find reptiles like rock dragons (fast lizards on the rocks), bobtails, western bearded dragons, and Grey's skinks. There's even a chocolate spotted frog and tadpoles of another frog species.
Wonderful Plants of Wadderin Sanctuary
Wadderin Sanctuary has at least 241 different native plant species. You can find areas with salmon gum, York gum, jam, and rock she-oak trees. There are also areas with mallee trees and shrubs.
In 2003, twelve different types of orchids were found in the reserve during a short visit. Students from Narembeen District High School have helped identify plants and plant new ones in the sanctuary and nearby bushland.
A Look Back at Wadderin's History
There are signs of at least four old water wells in Wadderin. These wells were there before the water collection system was built in the 1920s. Farmers might have built many small tanks near granite rocks to collect water for their farms, which started around 1900 in the Narembeen area. Another idea is that early sandalwood cutters used these wells.
Wadderin was also the location of Wadderin Hill School. This school operated from 1919 to 1936. You can find a plaque marking the school site within the sanctuary today.
