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Maria Island

World Heritage Listed Maria Island is located just off Tasmania’s east coast and is known for it’s historic ruins, picturesque bays, rugged cliffs and mountains and amazing fossils. But for many visitors, it is the island’s remarkable collection of rare birds and animals, largely unaffected by human presence, that is the highlight.

When the island became a National Park in the 1970s, a variety of threatened and endangered species were introduced and so it became an island sanctuary, a kind of “Noah’s Ark” for Tasmanian wildlife. In more recent times the next chapter of this island ark story played out when a population of healthy Tasmanian Devils were introduced.

The island is home to all Tasmania’s endemic birds including one of Australia’s rarest and smallest birds the endangered Forty-spotted Pardalote which has only five remaining population groups, of which Maria island is the largest remaining stronghold.