Devil Worship

To learn more about the plight of Tasmanian Devils and how you can help, visit Save The Tasmanian Devil at www.tassiedevil.com.au

Special features:

SLIDESHOW: Devil Worship

BLOG: Charles Wooley on the beast that stalked his childhood dreams

Full transcript:

CHARLES WOOLEY: The spectacular beauty of the Tasmanian wilderness. Its dramatic mountains and deep valleys shelter ancient and mysterious forests. It is a hard and uncompromising land where only the fittest survive. And out here, this was the greatest survivor of all - the Tasmanian devil. The world's largest marsupial carnivore. A noisy, argumentative, bone-crunching fearsome little package about the size of a terrier dog. But now, it might be headed for oblivion.

CLARE HAWKINS: This is our icon and we know what is going on. We are quite clear there is a serious decline and it is clearly due to this horrible cancer. And we've got all hands to the pump.

CHARLES WOOLEY: A new and deadly strain of infectious cancer is wiping out this Tasmanian mascot. Already more than half are gone. It is cruel and disfiguring and there is no cure. For those trying to save the devil like Zoologist Clare Hawkins it becomes personal and distressing. Poor bugger. That is so horrendous

CLARE HAWKINS: Yeah, I think it's good if people can see but it's pretty upsetting.

CHARLES WOOLEY: It's the devil facial tumour disease and it is certainly confronting. These gruesome cancers develop on the face and are spread every time the devils bite each other. Scientists think it started more than a decade ago, a genetic mutation of unknown origin. Whatever the cause the outbreak has been rapid and widespread. It must be rare for a new disease like this to occur in any species?

CLARE HAWKINS: We know one other species that gets a disease like this transmissible cancer. Yes, it is an extremely unusual thing to occur.

CHARLES WOOLEY: I don't think the plastic gloves will give me much protection or is it protecting them against me? Within another 10 years this may be the only way to see a Tasmanian Devil - in wildlife parks like this one. He tapped me on the leg to let me know. Preserving a population of captive, healthy devils with even healthier appetites. He's got a fine set of mashers in there.

ANDROO KELLY: He went straight through the food.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Androo Kelly is maintaining a population of disease-free devils at his wildlife park in northern Tasmania. It is a Noah's Ark of sorts and short term the best hope for the species. That's the sound I heard at night as a kid.

ANDROO KELLY: Yeah. A banshee.

CHARLES WOOLEY: All you did was hear them. You say... your advice in here is keep moving otherwise they'll think you're food?

ANDROO KELLY: That's it, if you stay still long enough they'll think you are food. Just keep moving.

CHARLES WOOLEY: I like that. In the high country around Cradle Mountain another captive population of healthy devils play in the snow. But for Androo Kelly the important thing is to find them healthy and in the wild. So he has been setting traps in this remote country to assess the spread of the disease. He speculates that, for now at least, the wild mountain ramparts of western Tasmania have proven a barrier to the infection. It's very quiet, have we got one in here?

ANDROO KELLY: We've got one here, you can feel it. There's one in there... ..it just quiet as. Look at that - a healthy 2-year-old.

CHARLES WOOLEY: How come it's not going you?

ANDROO KELLY: It's timid. They are a very timid creature. I wouldn't advise putting your hand in the mouth.

CHARLES WOOLEY: I won't do it then. In good health? Apparently no tumours or anything like that?

ANDROO KELLY: The good news is the disease has not spread through here in the last two years.

CHARLES WOOLEY: No animal symbolises the Tasmanian wilderness quite like the devil. But they also serve us well environmentally - as nature's undertakers. And they've done a valuable job of keeping out feral species like foxes and cats. Yet many locals still see them as a sheep- and chicken-killing pest.

ANDROO KELLY: Regardless of this disease, devils still suffer persecution and have a very bad reputation amongst a lot of Tasmanians. They don't respect this animal enough.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Of course you love these animals?

ANDROO KELLY: I do. They are Tasmanian. They are the spirit of our place.

CHARLES WOOLEY: The Tasmanian devil population is just a small marooned remnant of a much larger population once widespread throughout Australia. Consequently, they have a shallow gene pool. They are genetically so closely related that any disease that can kill one, can in time kill all. So their best hope for survival now lies in a protected breeding program and in the hope that some diversity can be discovered and encouraged. Fortunately, they are prolific and enthusiastic breeders. Tell me about the sex life of the devil?

CLARE HAWKINS: Well, I think the male really does exert a certain malesness over the female.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Does he really, cave man-like, drag the female into the cave?

CLARE HAWKINS: It does look a bit like that, yeah.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Part of the biology that fascinates me is that they produce something like 28 embryos - all or whom try to make that perilous journey from the birth canal to the pouch, but only four make the journey. That's rigorous selection of the fittest, isn't it.

CLARE HAWKINS: Yes, absolutely. Absolutely.

CHARLES WOOLEY: The fight to save the devil has been a depressing one but at last there's a faint glimmer of hope - the chance discovery of a single devil with a genetic immunity to the disease. A possible saviour who has been dubbed 'Cedric'.

PROFESSOR GREG WOODS: Okay, we'll just grab these samples, you know this is part of your routine.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Professor Greg Woods, an immunologist who normally treats cancer in humans, made the breakthrough. The amazing thing is, I mean, this is different territory for you blokes, I mean, you deal in human cancers. GREG WOODS: We deal in human cancers. Interestingly, the test we do in human cancers is exactly the same.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Then came more good news. While we were at his Hobart laboratory, Professor Woods discovered Cedric was not alone. Another devil showed the same immunity response. Together, they could form the beginnings of a genetic breeding programme for disease-resistant devils. So would that be the next stage - to breed from devils with the immune response?

PROFESSOR GREG WOODS: We can breed some animals that have the potential to produce an immune response to this tumour.

CHARLES WOOLEY: The search is on for other animals like Cedric. And perhaps they are to be found here - the wild coastal farm of Joe King. So, where the hell are we?

JOE KING: Right on as far west as you can get, really, with some of the cleanest air in the world blowing over us.

CHARLES WOOLEY: This land on Tasmania's rugged west coast has been held by Joe's family for four generations, but now he has signed it over to nature and to give the devil his due. What an amazing place. It must be one of the wildest places on earth.

JOE KING: Oh, it's fantastic.

CHARLES WOOLEY: And the windiest.

JOE KING: No, but it's great when you get down here in these conditions.

CHARLES WOOLEY: And you've made it over to nature or nature's taken it back ?

JOE KING: I've put covenants on the property so it now will be protected into time.

CHARLES WOOLEY: The Tasmanian Devil is rarely seen in the wild. And if you want an intimate glimpse into one of nature's most elusive creatures Joe King is the man to see. But first, you must invite the devil.

JOE KING: We've got a bit of road kill here, Charlie. This is our dinner invitation. They have an incredible sense of smell. That will be something that makes them interested in coming to where we are.

CHARLES WOOLEY: It's all a matter of sitting and waiting and while the night closes in and the wind roars around the shack, it's time to tell tall Tasmanian tales, dark stories of people who died in the bush and whose bodies were never found. And the story that scared me when I was a kid was about the missing preacher that he got eaten by the devil. Is that possible ?

JOE KING: He could have been. His bones would have been scattered in concentric circles around where he died.

CHARLES WOOLEY: As they pulled him apart?

JOE KING: Yeah, there's been plenty of suicides investigated in the bush where exactly that situation has happened. You find a man hung, and his legs are missing.

CHARLES WOOLEY: Ooh! Turn up the lights. And then after patient waiting, finally, not the zoo animals you normally get to see but fair dinkum wild Tassie devils materialise out of the dark. He knows where here doesn't he?

JOE KING: I don't think so. We're keeping away from him. He can't smell us and he can't hear us.

CHARLES WOOLEY: I tell you what, the scent should be getting outside.

JOE KING: We could have devils everywhere. Can you see anything?

CHARLES WOOLEY: They are doing very nicely,

JOE KING: Excellent!

CHARLES WOOLEY: Not many people get to sup with the devil and tell the tale. Do the other farmers say "Joe King has finally flipped? "He's allowed his farm to go to the devil?"

JOE KING: Sure, it might have seemed like a crazy idea at the time, but as time has gone by more and more people are seeing that there is a value in wildlife.

CHARLES WOOLEY: It may already be too late to save the devil. The fate of this little animal looks grim. The numbers are low, nobody knows how low. They are impossible to count but it must be nearing that critical level where a species goes extinct in the wild. But the worst will only happen despite the best efforts of the devil's advocates.

JOE KING: I would never have expected to develop a loyalty, a life passion for this animal from my background and yet that's what's happened.

CLARE HAWKINS: This is in some ways the embodiment of Tasmania - this feisty, characterful beast. If nothing else, even if we don't get it right the devil may be the first to sort it out.

PROFESSOR GREG WOODS: Each has their own personality. The devils that we work with in our research, we know them by name which is not very scientific, but you get very attached to them. They each have their uniqueness and they're not ugly at all, they're beautiful. They're beautiful, Charles.