Save the Cassowary from Extinction in Australia

Rainforest Rescue’s Daintree Manager and volunteers continue to see southern cassowaries and their chicks north of the Daintree River, near Rainforest Rescue already protected land. Frequency of sightings reassures the whole team that the cassowary population numbers are healthy and growing, especially seeing cassowary offspring. Your support in helping us rescue, and restore, the habitat of these incredibly important endangered cassowaries is really paying off – for the rainforest, and the Earth.

Further great news for the Daintree’s cassowaries is that we are almost at our goal to buy back and protect forever our latest appeal property - Lot 27 Cape Tribulation Rd!

Amongst other precious, vulnerable, rare and endangered flora and fauna – the Southern Cassowary too calls this rainforest property home. This land was at the highest threat - in the midst of our appeal another buyer appeared and risked starting a bidding war which would be disastrous for the Daintree and conservation efforts. We managed to broker a deal with the owner to take our bid at asking – even though the rival was willing to go significantly higher. Fortunately, the owner chose to protect this land and go with Rainforest Rescue, even though it meant less money in their pocket. This means that all the rainforest animals that find themselves on Lot 27 will soon be safe and protected forever.

Cassowary droppings on Lot 27 show this is a regular path on the Cassowary’s foraging journeys through this habitat. Known as the ‘rainforest gardener’, the cassowary is able to swallow seeds that are too large (and toxic) for other animals – and then when they ‘poop’ the seeds out – they are then safe and in a small enough size for the other animals to eat!

The cassowary ‘poop’ also grows trees! It is full of lots of seeds so this too helps to strongly build a rainforest.

Thank YOU for helping us support the Southern Cassowaries and their offspring, to grow up in the safest habitat possible in the Daintree rainforest. They are safer because of YOU!

In 2015 Rainforest Rescue was approached by land-owner Annie S. to return fifteen hectares of old sugarcane fields back to thriving Daintree lowland rainforest. This is now known as the Nightwings Project.

In 2016 and 2017 with the help of many individuals, organisations and businesses, like YOU - we cultivated and started planting trees and revived a wetland area to draw in wildlife. Between 2018 and 2019 tens of thousands of trees were planted at NightWings to repair this damaged land.

By the project’s end, these seedlings will be flourishing between the lowland Daintree to the upland Rainforest and beyond to the coast.

We were very pleased to reveal to you around seven months ago that for the first time in over forty years an endangered Southern Cassowary was spotted here near Nightwings. This is significant as sugarcane does not attract cassowaries - rainforest species do. Since this time (around seven months ago) we had not spotted a Cassowary since.

However, just last night Joe our Land Manager wrote to say that this same Cassowary was spotted once again at Nightwings!

He writes: “We think it’s the same one as before …it’s now fully mature and looks like having established its territory there. Forty years, no sighting, then after revegetation – Bingo, Christmas in November.”

Joe claims this is a sure sign that regenerates work in bringing back wildlife especially the endangered Cassowary, to rainforest now thriving, that was once devasted.

The Southern Cassowary is a ‘keystone’ species. Through eating the fruit and pooing out the seeds of rainforest plants, it plays a vital role as the ‘rainforest gardener’. Many plants depend on the cassowary for survival. Without them, the future of the rainforest is in peril.

Southern Cassowaries are shy by nature and only pose a threat to humans and domestic animals when defending their nests or chicks, if they have become accustomed to hand feeding, or when threatened.

With your help, you have joined us to save this magnificent and little understood Australian by extending its habitat and making it safe. Thanks to you the Southern Cassowaries’ population numbers are increasing.