Save The Bilby Fund
Our Vision
Our vision is to save the bilby from extinction in our lifetime.
Our focus is to help build an insurance population of 10,000 bilbies in Australia by 2030.
We breed and release captive bilbies to a sanctuary surrounded by a predator exclusion fence in Currawinya National Park with the aim of building a population of 400 free-living bilbies.
The Fund
Save the Bilby Fund is a national charity launched on 28 March 1999 by the late Frank Manthey OAM and the late scientist Peter McRae to raise the money to build the fence in an effort to stop the steady decline of bilby numbers.
Our Values
Honesty, integrity, passion, commitment and transparency.
Our Team
CEO, Feral animal eradicator, Bilby researcher
Kev joined Save the Bilby Fund in 2002 and has been its CEO since 2014.
Immediately prior to his current role, Kev was the former Director of Veterinary Services and Animal Operations with the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) Queensland. His primary responsibilities included strategic planning and operational and administrative management of animal and veterinary operations for the RSPCA state wide.
Kev has made significant contributions to improving captive animal care and welfare as well as wildlife conservation outcomes through a well respected career in the Zoological Industry spanning 30 years. He is the current Chair of he Greater Bilby National Recovery Team and a member of the Greater Bilby Meta-population Management Sub-Committee.
- Current Chair Greater Bilby National Recovery Team (2015- Current)
- Greater Bilby Meta-population Management Sub-Committee Member (2015-Current)
- Director- Center for Animal Welfare and Ethics (CAWE) University of Queensland (2012-Current)
- Director of Veterinary Services and Animal Operations, RSPCA Queensland.
- Animal Welfare and Ethics Committee member, RSPCA Queensland.
- Former Chief Operating Officer and General Manager Life Sciences Dreamworld/Whitewater World, Gold Coast Australia.
- Past President: Australasian Regional Association of Zoological Parks and Aquaria, Queensland Branch (ARAZPAQ).
- Board Member: Australasian Regional Association of Zoological Parks and Aquaria (ARAZPA).
- Founding Chairman: ARAZPA Accreditation Committee.
- Appointed Representative to the Recreational and Commercial Animal Management Advisory Committee (RACAMAC) to the Minister for the Environment Queensland (2003–2007).
- Zoological Industry Representative: Rural Industry Training Advisory Council, advising State and Federal Government training priorities.
- Representative of the Animal Care and Management Working Group to develop qualification framework for the Captive and related Animal Care Sectors.
- Board member: National Industry Steering Committee for the Animal Care and Management Training Package.
- Representative of the captive animal sector/ Animal Care and Management Training Package 2003/ 2004. Course development – implementation and endorsement.
- Convenor: National Zookeeper Education Working Group.
- Committee Member: Course Development Advisory Committee (CDAC) for Cert III in Native Animal Rehabilitation.
Sara, originally from the UK, lives in Brisbane and has been working part-time with the Save the Bilby Fund since late 2018.
Sara is working to ensure that the fund has enough income to carry out the steps needed to save the bilby. We have lost more income streams than we could brook and so we have had to quickly use her expertise in fundraising to plug the gaps.
A fundraising all-rounder, Sara is super pragmatic and determined for Save The Bilby Fund to achieve sustainable growth, on a shoestring.
Cass (left) and Kev holding a Bilby
Cass is a PhD candidate at The University of Queensland undertaking research on the Greater Bilby (Macrotis lagotis). Cass’s research is being undertaken in collaboration with Save the Bilby Fund and Arid Recovery, where she is investigating the home range and movements of reintroduced bilby populations. Cass is tracking bilbies in fenced reserves at Currawinya National Park in south-west Queensland’s mulga lands and in the arid zone in South Australia, using novel, light-weight GPS logging devices. This research aims to investigate the effects of climatic zone and bilby density on home range size and movements, to better understand the spatial ecology and requirements of reintroduced bilby populations in fenced reserves.
Our Board of Directors
Paul has been a director of Save the Bilby Fund since 2010 and helped implement their ‘Bilby Tracks’ citizen science trips to outback Queensland.
Rachel has been involved with Save the Bilby Fund from the early days of the fund and board director since 2015.
Board director since 2012.
Involved with Save the Bilby Fund for over 17 years.
How we spend your donations...
The Save the Bilby Fund is a tiny Australian registered charity which receives no recurrent government funding. We are totally reliant on the support and generosity of Australians to achieve our vision.
We are incredibly grateful for every gift, large or small and we understand your expectation that it should be spent directly on our work. As a tiny team who all work part-time from home or in the field we minimise expenditure where possible and seek only to cover our costs at each stage of delivering to the National Recovery Plan.
We dedicate our time and effort in these areas –
- Our CEO, Kevin Bradley is Chair of the Greater Bilby Recovery Team
- Monitoring of the predator exclusion fence at Currawinya National Park
- Building the population of bilbies behind the fence to around 400
- Breeding genetically diverse bilbies for release in Currawinya and other similar sanctuaries across Australia
- Enabling critical bilby research
- The Charleville Bilby Experience
