Phillip Island removed foxes; little penguin colony grew from 12,000 to 40,000

Phillip Island’s little penguins once faced a crisis that threatened to erase much of their presence from the island. By the 1980s, nine of its 10 penguin colonies had disappeared, while the final colony on the Summerland Peninsula was also under pressure from introduced predators, habitat loss and human activity. According to Phillip Island Nature Parks, a long-running conservation effort combining fox control, habitat restoration, scientific research and land rehabilitation helped reverse that decline. The surviving little-penguin population grew from about 12,000 in the mid-1980s to an estimated 40,000 today. The story, detailed in the organisation’s pest-control, research and history records, shows how protecting wildlife often requires more than removing a single threat—it demands sustained cooperation between scientists, governments, local communities and visitors.