I only hope s/he didn’t have me in mind!

Nevertheless, the response is a good one - and a challange at that; what indeed was in my mind when I had this vague notion that 80 - 95% of various types of habitat had been destroyed?

A quick search of the Australian Government website for the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry produces the following observation from the “Land cover change in Australia” report (2000) (ftp://ftp.brs.gov.au/outgoing/longterm/lw/lcc_report.pdf)

“Clearing and extensive thinning of woody vegetation have meant that by the 1980s only five percent of the continent remained forested, and the area of woodland had decreased from 21 to 14 percent.”

So, quite correctly, not 95% of the woodland has been cleared - only about 33%, but on the other hand, only 5% of the continent remains forested - so I guess pre European colonisation would have the continent with about 7% woodland cover.

My guess is I fell victim to some political campaign at some point, which presented the statistics in such a way as to say “only 5% of our country remains forested” - gasp.

Thank you for helping me set this record straight for the general viewing public at cryptomundo.com!

Chris.

Thylacoleo was(is?) larger than the thylacine, or at least the modern species. There were several species of thylacine, the current one being one of the comparative midgets. The largest was about 20 ft and had a different body form.

Nowhere near 80% has been axed, and, with a more environmentally conscious world, the continued existance of much of our biodiversity is assured.

Until I can get a better site, my crypto blog is located at http://www.xanga.com, and is titled CryptoInformant_007.

Ditto the Tassie/car/Eastern Quoll experience. I know about the breeding program in Lithgow, but as far as I know, the Eastern Quoll is considered extinct on mainland. (Which is not to say it necessarily is, of course!)

Chris.