Nov. 20, 2022 - Australia - Kangaroos, etc.

A trip to Australia wouldn’t be complete without seeing kangaroos. I expected them to be everywhere, but sightings were sporadic. Most sightings were of single animals or, at most, three or four of them. This is an Eastern Gray Kangaroo. It’s a large animal; one reference said it could be 4 to 5 feet tall with a tail that could be 3 feet long.

KangarooEasternGreyQueensland20220918

Red Kangaroos are the largest marsupial in the world. An adult male can be up to 6 feet tall and weigh almost 200 pounds. Males have a reddish coat and females have a gray coat.

KangarooRedQueensland202209222close

Wallabies are much smaller than Kangaroos. This is a Mareeba Rock Wallaby. We saw a group of these Wallabies at the Granite Gorge Nature Park in Mareeba, Queensland.

WallabyMareebaRockcloseGraniteGorgeNaturePark20220916

This is a female Wallaby with her baby, called a joey, in her pouch.

WallabyMareebaRockwithJoeyGraniteGorgeNaturePark20220916

These Mareeba Rock Wallabies are wild, but they hang around the park because tourists can buy food pellets to feed them. This is me feeding one of them. I couldn’t find any information on how big these animals are but, from this photo, you can see that they are quite small.

EarlfeedingbabyMareebaRockWallabyGraniteGorgeNaturePark20220916

Here’s our tour leader, Ben, getting some advice from a Wallaby.

BenKnootwithbabyMareebaRockWallabyGraniteGorgeNaturePark20220916

On Bruny Island, Tasmania, we stopped at a restaurant to have brunch. This Bennet’s Wallaby was sitting beside the parking lot. It appeared to be taking a nap while soaking up some warmth from the sun.

WallabyBennet'sBrunyIslandTasmania20220927

During our stay at O’Reilly’s Rainforest Retreat, we got up early to watch the Red-necked Pademelons search for food on the lawn. It is also a member of the kangaroo family.

PandemelonRedneckedO'ReilysRainforestRetreatLamingtonQueensland20220924

We were hiking along a forest path at Mount Wellington, Tasmania, when we spotted this Tasmanian Pademelon, also known as Red-bellied Pademelon.

PandemelonTasmanianRedbelliedMt.WellingtonTasmania20220926

This animal wins my vote as the strangest animal we saw on the trip. It is a Kangaroo, but, as you can see, it lives in the trees. It’s appropriately named Lumholtz’s Tree Kangaroo. It is in the same family as other Kangaroos and carries its young in a pouch. Its diet consists mostly of leaves from many different kinds of trees.

TreeKangarooLumholtz'sNeradaTeaPlantationQueensland20220917

I included this photo so you can see how long the Tree Kangaroo’s tail is. I found one reference that said the mother has only one joey at a time and it lives in her pouch. It doesn’t even begin to look outside the pouch until it is 250 days old. It might leave the pouch when it is 300 days old.

TreeKangarooLumholtz'sNeradaTeaPlantationQueensland20220917