Koalas are mainly nocturnal animals that spend the day asleep in the fork of the tree. They are solitary animals and will aggressively protect their individual territories. Fights can be extremely violent with opponents vigorously scratching and biting each other.
Because of their limited diet, the koala is only found in the eucalypt forests of eastern Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria, as well as the far southeastern part of South Australia. They move around regularly, travelling between favourite food trees.
Although koalas are still reasonably common in some areas, they face many problems including habitat destruction, disease and introduced predators. Many koalas die from bacterial infections, particularly Chlamydia, mainly due to stress caused by the formation of high density populations from habitat loss. Infections often cause eye diseases such as conjunctivitis which may lead to blindness if left untreated. The koala is not a bear as it is sometimes called. It is a marsupial and not even closely related to true bears. The word koala is Aboriginal for 'no drink', however, although they find most of their moisture requirements in their diet, they will occasionally drink from standing water.
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