Australian wildlife
Kangaroos and wallabies being hand fed |
My brother and niece (who live in the US) and I visited a wildlife reserve a few weeks ago as my niece really wanted to meet some Australia wildlife. I thought I would share with you some of the furry friends we met. The nice thing about this park was being able to mingle with some of the animals face-to-face and as you can see from the photos above, able to feed them. These kangaroos and wallabies have all been hand reared, therefore very use to humans and in fact, we decided, very dog like as they kept following us.
In case you were wondering how kangaroos and wallabies differ, whilst they belong to the same family (macropods and marsupials), Kangaroos are bigger at around 8 foot compared to the wallaby at 2 feet, kangaroos have longer legs between the knees and ankles and the wallaby has a brighter and more colourful coat whilst the kangaroo has more sober colours. Kangaroos eat grasses whilst the wallaby eats mostly leaves in more forest areas. (SOURCE)
Mother with her baby "joey" |
You will notice some white kangaroos, these are albino and if in the wild would not survive due to their colour and eye sight making it difficult to dodge predators. However in the safety of a reserve they are doing very well and were very sweet and affectionate. We thought the big albino at the back was older than the rest and kept wanting lots of pats.
New friends |
This beautiful bird is a Kookaburra and we have a family living in our street. If you have never heard the sound of a kookaburra laughing, listen to these as its rather lovely (CLICK HERE), in particular the "Kookaburra in the evening" because that is the sound I often hear when I am at home.
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One thing my American niece wanted to do was hold a koala and now she can tick it off her bucket list. She said it was like hold a very heavy baby which was very soft and fury! Koalas are not bears even though they might look a little bear like. They are related to kangaroos and wombats and are a marsupial mammal. If you want to learn more about koalas, check out this PAGE as its full of information.
I hope you enjoyed these beautiful fury creatures as much I did seeing them.
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Jo, thank you for your lovely comment on my review of Robin Lee Hatcher's book. I love your blog and couldn't resist subscribing to it.
ReplyDeleteYour art posts are also great. One of my favorite ways to relax is by working jigsaw puzzles on my computer, and during the past couple of years through simple google searches, I've discovered a world of beautiful art. I'm not sure I have the time to blog about it, but that would certainly be fun.
Thankyou so much for dropping by. I thoughtfully enjoyed your blog, anyone who writes about books is great!!! I love books and love to hear about new books. I just don't have enough time in the day to read them all!!
DeleteI love art and there is simply so much great art out there by the famous and not so famous. I do a blog piece every Friday as its such a nice way to end the week:))
God bless.
Jo, I appreciate your comments about my blog because writing is hard for me. I always excelled at grammar, diagramming, etc. in school and struggled just to pass when it came to composition. I won't even say how long it takes me to write a review, but it's a great way to support and encourage authors I enjoy.
DeleteYou have inspired me to highlight art that I enjoy once in a while. Not sure I'll have time to do it every week, but we'll see. I'm not ready to post it yet, but plan to feature some Christmas scenes by Nicky Boehme to start with. Hopefully you'll see it when I do post, and I'll give you the credit for the idea.
May you and your loved ones have a blessed Christmas season, Jo.
Carol, when I read your comment this morning I completely understood. It takes me ages to write blogs as I am not good at grammar and spelling is very bad (thanks for spell check!!). But I try to write from the heart and often pray before I commence for guidance - and that does make things so much easier. I also re-read what I have written a few days later, especially if the topic is a passionate one for me incase I offended too many people!!!
DeleteGreat choice with Nicky Boehme, reminds me of Thomas Kinkad. I just love her detail on the houses she paints :)))
Have a wonderful day
In the area where Dan used to work in NSW, wombats were very frequently seen roaming around wild - in fact, they were pests and would get into his boss's garden and trash and make a horrible mess of the vegie patch and they would scavenge in the trash and made a real racket!!!
ReplyDeleteI wonder if albino animals get sunburnt easily??
Wombats are vey good diggers so I could imagine the mess they would make. I once watched a documentary about someone who cared for wombats that had been injured or their mothers had died and they bond very well with humans and love to sleep on beds etc.. just like dogs and cats!!
DeleteI remember reading a story in the local newspaper about an albino kangaroo being spotted in the wild and saying how rare it was to see and how they don't survive very long due to their poor eye sight and in their inability to blend into their environment. I would assume they would have trouble with the sun. The ones we saw were in excellent condition and were very happy. I noticed that some of the non-albino mothers had albino joeys.
Hi Jo, these pictures are just great. We live in Victoria near the Grampians National Park and it is great to go there and see the masses of kangaroos around. Also the other day when we went to town there was a koala crossing the road just in town, poor thing had no road sense and we were able to stop traffic until it crossed the road. Blessings to you.
ReplyDeleteI grew up in country South Australia (near the Barossa) and we never saw wild kangaroos and koalas however 40 years on there are returning the the Hills and when I was last there I finally saw kangaroos in the wild. Sadly, we also saw a dead Koala on the side of the freeway. So glad you were able to protect your koala, they are too precious to be killed by cars.
DeleteI live in the Australian Capital Territory and we see lots of kangaroos here, sadly I also see many dead along the road ways as we are surrounded by so much bushland.
Blessings to you :)
Your photos are wonderful. I especially love the kookaburra!
ReplyDeleteThe kookaburra must have thought he was very pretty as he didn't move once when I was photographing him!!
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