Northen Brown Bandicoots in the NT Receive a Helping Hand Sophie

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Northen Brown Bandicoots in the NT Receive a Helping Hand Sophie

Northern brown bandicoots in the Northern Territory recieve a helping hand ! By Sophie Moles Recent research has created useful diagnostic resources to evaluate the health of wild northern brown bandicoots in the Top End, NT. The northern brown bandicoot is a native terrestrial marsupial found in the northern and eastern parts of Australia, including New Guinea. The northern brown bandicoot is considered one of the most common bandicoot species, however in recent years has faced threats including predation and fire within the Northern Territory (NT), the geographic focus of this study. Given the significant declines of other marsupials within the NT, such as the Northern Quoll, pre-emptive strategies like the consolidation of health data for the northern brown bandicoot should aid the management of this species. This study used blood, collected in previous fieldwork, from 81 wild northern brown bandicoots in the Top End of the NT to create reference intervals (RI) which are a range of normal values which blood results are compared against to indicate health status, with values outside RI suggestive of ill-health. As previously no RI existed for wild northern brown bandicoots within the Top End, and although RI were established for other bandicoot species, species-specific RI are a more accurate tool to detect disease. This study reported RI, the 2.5th and 97.5th percentile, as well as summary statistics for the entire cohort, and for male and female northern brown bandicoots, as seven blood components were identified as significantly different between the sexes. As for RI, no morphological description of white blood cells existed for this species. Therefore, this study described the morphology of the five white blood cells using light microscopy. The examination of white blood cells is used to determine haematological RI, and specific disease processes alter white blood cell morphology, making these descriptions a useful resource when evaluating the health of wild northern brown bandicoots. Overall, the development of species and location specific RIs and description of white blood cells for the northern brown bandicoot in the Top End, will aid in the interpretation of any health data (e.g. identifying infectious disease agents) obtained from wild individuals in this region, as well as inform the management of captive counterparts in zoos and rehabilitation programs. 1300 687 3624 murdoch.edu.au CRICOS Provider Code: 00125J.

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