Miffy, one of the new koalas homed at Yanchep National Park, has given birth, with footage of the mother and her joey released by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions this week.
Seven-and-a-half-year-old Miffy, originally from Ballarat Wildlife Park, Victoria, was unveiled to the WA public last October after a seven-week quarantine period.
She arrived along with two 18-month-old brothers Louie and Franklin Doogsie, from Cleland Wildlife Park, in South Australia.
Now 10 months after settling into their new home, Miffy has successfully produced a joey with Louie.
The Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (DBCA) said the joey, estimated to be about five-months-old, would be named at a later date.
Prior to the December 2019 Yanchep bushfire there were eight koalas in the colony located in the national park’s enclosure.
Koala numbers fall at Yanchep National Park in October 2022 reported there were only four koalas left in the colony, with DBCA telling Yanchep News Online that four females from the colony had been humanely euthanised since 2019 due to declining health arising from old age.
During a February 2020 interview Parks and Wildlife Service district manager Mark Cugley told Yanchep News Online that DBCA, the Parks and Wildlife Service and Perth Zoo had been talking about the feed and habitat challenges that were facing koalas over east as Yanchep National Park could accommodate more koalas.
In the 2020 interview Yanchep National Park senior ranger Pip Jarvis Carboon talked about keeping the small colony of koalas safe during the big bushfire.
This week she said the team at Yanchep was ecstatic.
“It’s what we’ve been working towards very definitely in all earnest for about the last six years.
So it’s a really big achievement.
“It was a day that we weren’t necessarily sure would happen.
I’m stoked. I’m so excited. It’s just brilliant.”
DBCA said koalas were first introduced into Yanchep National Park in 1938.
The last one born in the park was 15-year-old Koodah, who is still resident in the koala colony, having descended from koalas brought to Yanchep from South Australia in the late 1980s.
This article appeared on Yanchep News Online on 23 August 2025.
