A spotted marsupial that searches for insects and other food at night.
Its coat varies from black to brown or tan and has white body spots. The muzzle is pointed, and the nose and ears are pink.
Reintroducing eastern quolls became a learning process at Mulligans Flat Woodland Sanctuary in the Australian Capital Territory. Across three trials from 2016 to 2018, estimated 42-day survival was 28.6% for 14 founders in Trial 1, 76.9% for 13 in Trial 2, and 87.5% for eight in Trial 3.
The team changed release tactics between trials, including using female-only founders in the later trials, and animals that moved dens less often were more likely to survive. The results show how monitoring can inform later releases, but they do not isolate the effect of any one tactic: several changes occurred together, samples were small, and the work took place at one fenced sanctuary. These short-term figures should not be read as a measure of recovery across the species’ native range.
Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC Act) · Endangered · Australia (national statutory listing)
The eastern quoll is listed as Endangered under Australia’s EPBC Act. The Australian Government profile identifies Tasmania as its native range and also describes a translocated population in New South Wales and safe-haven populations in the Australian Capital Territory and Victoria. A 2020 release study shows one example of using short-term survival results to adjust later trials, but its cohorts were small and several tactics changed together. Those results do not establish a species-wide recovery trend. Government materials also describe habitat restoration and feral-cat control in Tasmania. The legal category here is Australia’s national listing, not a global IUCN assessment.