WIRES volunteers do their best to attend injured animals along the road quickly. Any dead animals are marked with spray paint to indicate to others the pouch has been checked.
It's Council's responsibility to clear road reserves of litter – which includes dead animals.
Sometimes Council crews come across an animal. Instead of waiting for WIRES, our crews can quickly retrieve a joey from a pouch and then contact a carer.
It was back in 2021 when WIRES volunteer Rachel McInnes visited Council to show us how it's done.
"Everyone saw the impact of the fires – we lost so many animals," Rachel said.
"We went around to Council and local police who travel the roads often and provided joey pouches with rescue information," she said.
You can find Rachel and other WIRES volunteers with joey pouches at markets across the shire. They happily share knowledge on how to rescue joeys.
"It's amazing to hear how many people have stopped to rescue a joey on the road. The pouch made all the difference to whether they stop or not."
Thanks to Rachel and WIRES, all our Council trucks have joey pouches on hand.
Every animal that's collected is also recorded by Council and WIRES. This data is very useful to support initiatives and funding for programs like the virtual fence.
- This story was first published in Council's quarterly newsletter for residents, Living in Eurobodalla. A printed edition is delivered to Eurobodalla's 26,000 households.
