Masked owls, wild devils and giant crayfish: inside the ancient forests of Tasmania’s Takayna

The Unesco -listed Tasmanian wilderness world heritage area is one of the largest conservation areas in Australia .

It contains living reminders of the ancient supercontinent Gondwana and is filled with evidence of a long and deep history of Aboriginal connection to place.

Only a fraction of Takayna is conserved under a national heritage listing.

The Tasmanian masked owl is a subspecies of the Australian masked owl, a large bird with a broad, heart-shaped face and dappled white-and-brown feathers.

There are thought to be only about 1,000 individual owls left, and the only way researchers have found to track them is through blind navigation of forest calls over exhausting nights in the wilderness.

Takayna is also home to the giant freshwater crayfish, a gargantuan azure-shelled creature.

Gros believes protecting Takayna through world heritage listing is all the more important.

Habitat loss is far and away the greatest threat to the masked owl’s survival.

But there is also something innately spiritual in the way he speaks about the place something that should not be ignored when assessing a place's ecological value.