Meet Bear, the dog who finds koalas injured in Australian bushfires

Bear, a cattle dog cross assists finding and saving koalas injured in the recent bushfires. Source: INSTAGRAM/@ficlarkphotography/via REUTERS

An obsessive-compulsive dog who was abandoned as a puppy has a new mission: helping find and save koalas injured in Australia’s recent devastating bushfires.

Bear, a Cattle Dog cross-breed, is trained to find both koalas and quolls, another small Australian marsupial, in the wild.

Bear undergoing training in Queensland in November, ahead of the horror fire season.
INSTAGRAM/@ficlarkphotography/via REUTERS

“This is the first year that we have been involved in the fires,” Romane Cristescu, his minder and ecologist at The University of the Sunshine Coast, told Reuters.

“It is a bit more dangerous than what we usually do.”

Bear, who usually looks for sick or injured wildlife for conservation and research purposes in calmer conditions, has been wearing protective socks on his paws to search through areas scorched by fire.

Bear wears special boots and a vest while working in fire zones.
INSTAGRAM/@ficlarkphotography/via REUTERS

Bushfires have ravaged around 2.5 million acres of farmland and bush across Australia’s east coast.

Thousands of hectares of koala habitat across northern NSW and southeast Queensland have been destroyed in the recent bushfires.