Australia's greater glider known for its death defying treetop leaps has gone from threatened to endangered in the space of six years.
Federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek on Tuesday pushed the southern and central glider, found along Australia's east coast, further up the list of concern.
Conservationists are alarmed by how rapidly the marsupial is sliding towards extinction.
WWF Australia ecologist Kita Ashman said the glider was relatively common before May 2016 when it was first listed as threatened under the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.
Dr Ashman said Tuesday's change of status, one rung up to endangered, appeared to have been triggered by the Black Summer bushfires of 2019/20, which destroyed about one third of the glider's habitat.
But the fires were merely the most recent calamity, she said.
"Those fires came off the back of years of habitat destruction through land clearing and logging and then the other impacts of climate change."
Dr Ashman fears the upgraded listing under federal laws might not achieve much given the threat posed by logging, which is managed by the states.
"In Victoria, for example, so much of their habitat overlaps with areas that are already set aside to be logged over the next few years.
"And it's all under regional forestry agreements, so it's all state government. They don't require any scrutiny under the EPBC Act. There's no onus on industry to have to respond to that.
"If the Andrews government wants to respond to this announcement and put in immediate protection areas for greater gliders and their habitat that would be the most amazing action that could come of this. I can't see it happening though."
AAP is seeking comment from the Victorian government.
