SHE fought an uphill battle from the start, but it seems the stakes were too high for little Marlee. This tiny koala joey, who has touched many hearts in Campbelltown after she was featured on our front page on February 22, died last Thursday night because of a lung infection. Her dedicated WIRES carer — Cate Ryan, of St Andrews — said she was "devastated".
"I found some phlegm in her throat that must have compromised her airways and she couldn't cough it up," Ms Ryan said. "There was nothing I could do. "We knew it was a long haul from the start with her. "She's with her mother now." Ms Ryan cared for Marlee around the clock after she was rescued from her dead mother's pouch in Kentlyn three weeks ago.
"We don't know how long she'd been in the pouch, but she was absolutely boiling hot when I got her and she peeled two layers of skin from her body," Ms Ryan said. "She probably had health problems from the beginning and it just took a few weeks for them to surface." She said Marlee had been feeding well and putting on weight in the week before she died.
Many residents left comments on the Advertiser's website and Facebook page. One reader even dropped a woollen blanket into our office to help keep Marlee warm. Ms Ryan said she would now focus on the other creatures in her care, including a baby brushtail possum and three baby sugar gliders.
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