{
    "@context": "https://schema.org",
    "@type": "NewsArticle",
    "@id": "https://badiyaa.com/australia-zoo-wildlife-hospital-avocado-shed-136000/#article",
    "mainEntityOfPage": "https://badiyaa.com/australia-zoo-wildlife-hospital-avocado-shed-136000/",
    "headline": "The avocado shed that became Australia Zoo’s wildlife hospital has now taken in 136,000 animals",
    "description": "Lyn Irwin's idea became a one-room clinic in 2004. The Queensland hospital now admits 9,000 to 10,000 animals a year, and birds make up 43 percent of patients.",
    "datePublished": "2026-10-21T18:01:00+01:00",
    "dateModified": "2026-10-21T17:36:15+01:00",
    "author": {
        "@type": "Organization",
        "name": "Badiyaa Editorial Desk",
        "url": "https://badiyaa.com/author/editorial-desk/"
    },
    "publisher": {
        "@type": "NewsMediaOrganization",
        "@id": "https://badiyaa.com/#organization",
        "name": "Badiyaa",
        "url": "https://badiyaa.com/",
        "logo": {
            "@type": "ImageObject",
            "url": "https://badiyaa.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/badiyaa-logo-color-600x60-1.png",
            "width": 600,
            "height": 60
        },
        "email": "badiyaavideo@gmail.com",
        "publishingPrinciples": "https://badiyaa.com/editorial-policy/",
        "correctionsPolicy": "https://badiyaa.com/corrections/",
        "actionableFeedbackPolicy": "https://badiyaa.com/contact/",
        "ownershipFundingInfo": "https://badiyaa.com/about/#ownership",
        "sameAs": [
            "https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61595518283625",
            "https://www.instagram.com/badiyaa.com.ai/",
            "https://www.threads.net/@badiyaa.com.ai"
        ],
        "parentOrganization": {
            "@type": "Organization",
            "name": "Rezilient Digital",
            "url": "https://www.rezilientdigital.com/",
            "address": {
                "@type": "PostalAddress",
                "streetAddress": "Fl No 3, Nav Shyam Sadan, Plot No 38, Pestom Sagar, Chembur",
                "addressLocality": "Mumbai",
                "addressRegion": "Maharashtra",
                "postalCode": "400089",
                "addressCountry": "IN"
            },
            "sameAs": [
                "https://www.linkedin.com/company/rezilientdigital"
            ]
        }
    },
    "isAccessibleForFree": true,
    "inLanguage": "en-US",
    "wordCount": 735,
    "image": [
        "https://badiyaa.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Koala_-_Australia_Zoo_-_Beerwah_Queensland_Australia_-_Flickr_-_Cindy_Andrie.webp",
        "https://badiyaa.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Koala_-_Australia_Zoo_-_Beerwah_Queensland_Australia_-_Flickr_-_Cindy_Andrie-1024x677.webp"
    ],
    "articleSection": "Pets & Animals",
    "keywords": "Australia Zoo, Irwin family, Queensland, Wildlife Hospital, Wildlife rescue",
    "articleBody": "The Australia Zoo Wildlife Hospital in Beerwah, Queensland, has now admitted more than 136,000 sick, injured and orphaned native animals, a tally its parent charity Wildlife Warriors gives for the years 2004 to 2024. It started in 2004 inside a converted avocado packing shed on the zoo grounds, and the story of how it began is circulating again this week. From a packing shed to a purpose-built ward The idea belonged to Lyn Irwin, Steve Irwin’s mother, who co-founded the original reptile park with her husband Bob in 1970 and was among the first people in southeast Queensland to rehabilitate wild animals. She died in a car accident in 2000. Steve and Terri Irwin fitted out the old shed as a clinic in her memory. That first hospital had a single operating room and could see up to about 6,000 animals a year. Steve Irwin died on September 4, 2006, after a stingray injury, and Terri Irwin became the zoo’s sole owner. The replacement hospital opened on November 15, 2008, a date the family marks as Steve Irwin Day. Built of mud brick and hay and covering about 1,300 square meters (14,000 square feet), it holds two operating theaters, an X-ray room, a pathology lab, separate intensive care wards for birds, mammals and reptiles, and a public drop-off area. Treatment is free to the public, and the charity says native wildlife is never turned away. How the numbers have grown The milestones give a rough sense of pace: 2004: the shed clinic opens. 2019-20 bushfire season: the hospital treats its 90,000th animal. December 2022: staff put the total above 120,000, including about 10,000 koalas. End of 2024: the charity’s running count passes 136,000. Spread evenly over those 20 years, 136,000 patients works out to 6,800 a year (136,000 divided by 20). The hospital now says it takes in between 9,000 and 10,000 animals in a 12-month period, so today’s workload runs roughly 30 to 45 percent above that long-run average. Birds make up 43 percent of admissions, possums and gliders 15 percent, reptiles 12 percent, koalas 9 percent and bats 5 percent. The charity names road traffic, attacks by pets and land clearing as the main reasons animals arrive. Inside the zoo’s own hospital tour The clearest look at a normal day comes from the zoo itself. In a nearly nine-minute tour posted to the Australia Zoo channel in April 2024, Bindi Irwin, now the zoo’s chief executive, and her husband Chandler Powell walk through triage, the reptile room, the bird ward and a treatment room. The useful parts are the specifics. Button, an orphaned common brushtail possum, came in after a tree was felled and his mother did not survive; he is shown cleared for care and waiting for a volunteer carer to collect him. Nurse Ree counts five newly hatched carpet pythons from a clutch of ten eggs that were rescued from a pile of mulch workers were about to move. A Brahminy kite named Scott is weighed at 550 grams, with a towel over his head to block his view and calm him. A young green sea turtle is checked after being found floating, with X-rays and blood tests planned. Bindi Irwin makes the point many viewers miss: “I think people don’t realize how long it takes,” she says, describing the long stretch with home carers after the hospital deals with the first trauma. Powell, in the reptile room, frames the zoo’s priorities as “protecting the scaly animals just as much as the cute and fluffy.” The clip has limits worth naming. It is the family’s own production, it closes with an invitation to visit, and it carries the zoo’s fundraising links. It does not say what happened to the turtle, how many patients are eventually released, or what the hospital costs to run. Some of the commentary leans emotional, with sea turtles called “little sea angels”. Read alongside the admission figures, though, it is an honest picture of routine work: weighing, feeding, counting hatchlings and handing animals on to carers. Why October matters Staff call September to February “trauma season,” when more active wildlife means more road accidents and admissions can triple. In the first six weeks of the 2022 season alone, 146 koalas were brought in. The hospital accepts emergency patients around the clock, every day of the year, and it is in that busiest stretch now. Further reading Wikipedia: Australia Zoo Image: Cindy Andrie from Victoria BC, Canada, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by our Editorial Desk. How we work.",
    "markdown": "https://badiyaa.com/australia-zoo-wildlife-hospital-avocado-shed-136000.md"
}