There are three species of pademelon in Australia: Thylogale billardierii (Tasmanian pademelon) Thylogale thetis and Thylogale stigmatica (latter two found in coastal NSW and coastal qld) The name Pademelon comes from the Dharuk language of the Sydney region, their word badimaliyan was anglicised/corrupted to paddymelon and pademelon. The Gippsland species was Thylogale billardierii which inhabited coastal forest and scrub in Southern Vic. Frank Bury of Metung claimed that in the early 1900s there were thousands in dense Melaleuca scrub on the Boole Poole and near Lakes Entrance. Only one Gippsland specimen (from Corner Inlet 1851) was lodged in the Museum of Vic. They (ie the Tasmanian species) are no longer present on the mainland. It was last recoded in east Gippsland in the 1930s. It is thought their decline/disappearance is related to the arrival of the fox. Foxes do not occur in Tasmania where pademelons are still common. [Linda, perhaps we need to look at the arrival dates of the fox?] The question of association with sandfly numbers is interesting. Certainly sandfly habitat is melaleuca scrub, but sandflies seem to be a south gippsland problem. They are not to my knowledge, and I am prepared to hear otherwise, a problem in melaleuca around the lakes/Boole Poole where pademelons were obviously common. According to the Australian National Dictionary the paddymelon that grows in inland Australia is an introduced African species (Cucumis myriocarpus) which bears a small bristly melon like fruit.