National Geographic News, Reporting Your World Daily

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Photo: Koala Groups Face Extinction Due to Changing Forests


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A koala clings to a eucalyptus tree in New South Wales, Australia. The marsupials exclusively eat eucalyptus leaves, and each population eats the leaves from only a select handful of the 700 eucalyptus species.

Now ecologists warn that pressures such as climate change, fire, and drought are changing the fragmented habitats where koalas live and putting whole populations at risk of extinction.

Photograph by Nicole Duplaix/NGS