James Cook University (JCU) researchers are calling for urgent government support to protect the spectacled flying-fox from extinction due to new and escalating threats.
Despite their reputation as noisy and messy neighbours, this native species is vital to the survival of Australia's rainforests – travelling vast distances pollinating flowers and spreading seeds at a level unmatched by any other species.
JCU adjunct associate professor Noel Preece's recent research showed that longtime threats like land clearing and human persecution are being coupled with climate change and invasive ants to leave the species vulnerable to extinction.
While several local groups and scientists are working to protect the species, which are found mostly in the Wet Tropics and around Cape York in Far North Queensland, a lack of government support could see them permanently wiped out.
"The spectacled flying fox is a keystone species," Prof Preece said.
"It's one of the great travellers in distributing seeds across the wet tropics and Cape York landscapes, and a major pollinator of the forest.
"They can fly over 100km from their roost to find food and return home, flying over 200 kilometres in a single night. They move fruit around, pollinate trees and prevent tree inbreeding, and they have evolved with the rainforest, so they play a vital role in the Wet Tropics.
"It will be truly catastrophic to our rainforests if they are gone."
CSIRO monitoring highlighted a sharp decline in spectacled flying-fox numbers, including dropping 75 per cent from between 2004 and 2017 Preece stressed that the need for government support has never been more critical.
"There's no indication that the population decline has turned around. There's nothing to suggest that, and no reason we can think of that it would just turn around," he said.
"We do need to get the government to support this as a long-term program. There's short term funding for Terrain (an independent and community-based not-for-profit organisation in Cairns) to continue the monitoring but even that was dropped for a couple of years.
"CSIRO was doing it on behalf of the states and federal governments but that stopped, and the national flying fox monitoring program has also been cancelled, so it's not available anymore, which is alarming, because it's an endangered species.
"The population rate of increase is very slow and while they might breed for five or six years, they only have one baby a year and the loss of young to predation, tick paralysis and other disease is also quite high."
While flying fox faces have long faced image problems Preece said the problems identified by people who are affected can be easily addressed.
"If you're getting poo landing on your barbecue, put it somewhere under cover. If it's going in your pool, put a cover over your pool," he said.
"The flying foxes don't stay in the same roost forever; they are gone in a few days or weeks and any roosts that are permanent are generally away from human habitation.
"The problems they cause can be managed, and their ecological value far outweighs the nuisance."
