Manx Wildlife Trust believes that there needs to be policies in place to manage the wallaby population in the island.

This comes after a wallaby was seen roaming around Ramsey on Tuesday.

Since the first wallabies escaped the Curraghs Wildlife Park in the 1970s, they have been breeding and roaming around wetland areas and plantations. However recently they have ventured further into residential areas with reports of wallaby sightings in Laxey and Onchan.

Leigh Morris, chief executive officer of Manx Wildlife Trust (MWT), said: ’We’ve had lots of conversations about the wallabies for years.

’The conversation needs to be had about managing them because currently there are no policies about wallabies in place.

’They are an exotic species that’s eating local flora and trampling nesting birds.

’If they keep breeding, there will be a negative impact on local flora and fauna before we can protect it.

’The wallabies are being spotted in Laxey and there are sightings in places they’ve never been seen before.’

The MWT believes that there are a number of issues surrounding the wallabies that need to be addressed.

This includes the welfare of the wallaby population, causing damage, blindness, breeding and how attractive they are to bringing in tourists.

He continued: ’Not all wallabies are bad but there needs to be a collective decision about what to do with them when we can because the problem is probably going to get bigger until we get something sorted.

’The welfare of them is important as we don’t know if some may be blind, what problems they have and whether they are dying.

’In zoos there are strict controls on determining which animals can and can’t breed to help prevent inbred wallabies, which may be happening here.’

Currently there is no monitoring or watch process set up to be able to track the location of wallabies in the island.

There is also no way of knowing how many wallabies there are in the island because of this, although Leigh estimates that it could have reached the four-figure mark.

Leigh said: ’This winter we are planning on holding a meeting to discuss island-wide stakeholder views on wallabies and how the island should manage them going forward.’