WOMBATS

HAIRY NOSED
WOMBAT

Wombats look like a small bear. They have thick bodies, small eyes and a big flattened head. Their short legs are powerful with sharp claws useful for digging. The wombats are nocturnal and live in a burrows.

Their body measures about 1 meter long and has short hairs. They belong to the marsupial species.

The marsupial pouches of digging animals, such as the wombat, open backwards to prevent the baby being showered with soil.

Wombats living in semi-arid shrublands in SouthAustralia and are well established. They have hairy noses in contrast to the common wombat.

Hairy-nosed Wombats living in the North of Australia are in danger of extinction. Conservationists think there  might be only 20 species left in the wild.

COMMON WOMBAT

In contrast, the common wombat living in Queensland and eastern Victoria are thriving. They live on slopes, creeks and gullies which has a sub-humid climate amongst eucalyptus forests.

The animals have very strong teeth which enables them to break-up the tough, fibrous grasses. It is the wombats diet.

Wombats do not fight and have stable social relationship. Their territory measures anything between 2.5 to 2.4ha depending on the habitat.

All wombat species are protected apart from the common wombat living in eastern Victoria.

POUCHED MAMMALS OR MARSUPIALS

Since Australia, New Guinea and South America was cut off by oceans for the last million years the pouched mammals have evolved. They exploit a separate and extraordinarily rich fauna which ranges from desert to rainforest.

Pouched mammals already existed at the time of the dinosaurs. At this time there were no continents as we know it today but one giant land mass, called Gondwanaland.

Australia, Antarctica, South America, New Guinea and the nearby islands broke apart when the tectonic plates split Gondwanaland. Over  centuries the ancestral mammals of these areas evolved new pouched species.

All over the world new mammals began to grow placentas and replaced pouched species.

When South America collided with North America resulting into one continent the pouched South American opossums moved north into a land dominated by placental mammals.

The pouched mammals evolved separately from their placental cousins but they started with an identical genetic history. The result was evolution duplicate species.

MARSUPIAL BIRTH
Not having a placenta to feed the baby with nutrients efficiently from the mother's body to the embryo, pouched mammals cannot nurture their babies very long therefore marsupials are born only partly formed,  The new born baby crawls up its mother's belly to the pouch. It attaches to one of her teats. It does not let go until it is capable to feed itself.

Most of the babies are able to get into the pouch but some are lost. To counteract nature has formed a fascinating back-up.

Marsupial females have  a double vagina and a double uterus into which the eggs are shed.  The male has a two-lobed penis to be able to fertilise one egg in each uterus.  The implantation and

development of the second egg can be delayed for weeks of months until the first baby stops suckling and leaves the pouch.

This enables the mother to breed immediately without a male. It also helps if the first baby died.

THE MARSUPIAL POUCH
Marsupials lead an active life, like Kangaroos. which has a single baby.

Many species of American opossums and Australian carnivorous pouched mammals have eight or more babies.

Their pouch is a fold of skin around the nipples. Attached to a nipple, the young are carried around. As they gain weight the whole litter is heavier than the mother. The moment they release her teats, she leaves them in a nest.

Different species have different ways of care of their babies.

RED KANGAROO

RED KANGAROO FEMALE WITH BABY 

The red kangaroo is the largest of all living marsupials. It is known as an unusual symbol of Australia. Ten years ago is was classed as a threatened species but its numbers recovered and is now to be found all over the outback.

Kangaroos and its relative only exist in Australia, Tasmania and New Guinea. It is also herbivores.

Their appearance is unique with its strong, long and muscular hind legs. Their front legs are very short and have small paws. Its tapered tail is large, long and muscular and serves as a support when the animal stands still. Without it the animal would not be able to balance. 

The tail is also used as a balance and rudder when the animal moves fast.  The kangaroo moved fast with leaping movements and the two large toes with long claws are used to grip and have a hold on the ground. The hind feet have also two small toes but there are used for grooming.

The kangaroo’s body is somewhat heavy at the bottom because of its muscular hind-legs. The body tapers off towards the head with its thin face, long rounded ears coming down to its blunt muzzle.

FEMALE KANGAROO

The males have a reddish-brown, short thick coat while the females have a bluish-grey one. On the legs and undersides the fur is paler.  However, in some areas the colours could reverse. The females could have reddish fur.  Males can be twice the size of females but never more than 1.7m in length.  When they are aggressive they can stand-up to being 2m tall.

Kangaroos vary in the social habits. On a whole the red kangaroos live in groups up to ten animals and is called a ‘mob’. Their groups are mostly temporarily and have not very strong tie or bonds to each other.

They prefer a habitat which is grass covered like plains or savannas.  At the same time they stay close to tenser vegetation or woodland for cover and shelter. They mostly feed at night but it had been observed they travel in daylight in cooler weather.

If there is a great food supply the mob stay close around a small area but at food shortage they travel great distances to find food.

On a whole the red kangaroo does not seem to have a territory as such. In spite of that larger animals can be aggressive.  Males can put up a fierce fight either for a female or its area.  In a fight the males stand up on their hind legs and kick out with their front legs but also with their hind legs to unbalance the opponent.

FOOD

Nature adapted the red kangaroo to a diet of grass and leafy herbs. Its stomach has many sac-like folds which increase the total surface area.  It is similar to the stomach of ruminants.  It contains bacteria and protozoa helping to convert cellulose in the plants to substances which can be digested and used.

They start grazing at sundown and through the night.  The animal moves slowly and nibbles on its way. While doing so it balances on its tail and forearms as it swings its hind legs forward. It is equipped with a sharp hearing and when alarmed it leaps forward using only its hind legs and tail. Each leap can be between 9-10m and the kangaroo can reach a speed of over 50km/h.

BREEDING

Red kangaroos can breed all year round but only if the food is plentiful. They are weighing the situation up and when the food supply is good they breed and in bad times they don’t breed at all.

After a gestation of about 33 days the young ones young is born. The baby weighs 0.75g and scrambles from the birth canal into the mother’s pouch and it feeds on the nipples. As small as it is, it had developed a large tongue for sucking, nostrils to breath and well formed forelimbs with digits for hanging onto the mother’s fur and it stimulate the mother’s milk.

The milk of kangaroos is more diluted than of animals that suckle their young for a short time. They usually have only one youngster at one time and it is call Joe. It is very rare that they have twins. The young ones stay in the pouch for three month. During further five months it will hop in and out of the pouch and at eight months it leaves it altogether. If the mother has not given birth to another it will suckle until it is one year old.

Females are ready to mate at the age of 15-2 months and the males a few months later.

CONSERVATION

Humans settling in the area caused a decline of their habitat and kangaroo’s numbers fell.  The red kangaroos do not seem to be affected by it. It not only prefers to graze on different grasses as those eaten by sheep it also like the close cropped grass left behind by sheep. Since their numbers increased rapidly the farmers felt threatened and worried about their livestock. They started to kill them in large numbers. They are also hunted for their furs and the USA is the biggest importer of kangaroo’s fur.

An average one million kangaroo skin was exported to the USA each year between 1963 and 1966. By 1986 the figure dropped by half.

NUMBAT

NUMBAT

The only species of its family and near extinction due to loss of habitat and predators brought in by man to Australia. It is a small marsupial.

Marsupial are animals which give birth to their young at a too early stage and the tiny baby crawls into the mother’s pouch, attaches it to its teat and continues growing. The numbat has a further distinction is has no pouch and the young ones attaches it to the mother’s nipples deep in the long fur. It lives there for four months.

The Numbat is the size of a squirrel and has a most attractively marked fur. Its coat is a reddish brown colour from head, shoulder and upper back. The lower back and rump have a number of black and white transverse stripes. The under fur is paler. It has a long very bushy tail and the bristly hairs are grizzled grey and white. A dark stripe with a wide border runs from the ear, around the eye and down along either side of the long, pointed muzzle. The animal has short, thick forelimbs which are widely spaced.  It has five toes on its front legs and four on the hind legs. Each toe has a strong claw.

NUMBAT ON THE LEFT
HAS ITS TONGUE
STICKING OUT

DIET

It was wrongly labelled as the banded anteater but it eats only terminates. The ants it does eat are only predators which went into the termites before the numbat broke into the termites nest. The nest is either in a log or underground tunnel. Therefore ants could have moved in and they scooped up with the termites.  The numbat does not dig or rip open the huge sun-baked mounts made by termite’s colonies.

The numbat differs again from other termites or ant-eater mammals but still share many of their characteristics.  The long claws to break into their nests, a long pointed snout, an extendible, cylindrical, sticky tongue for getting to the termite in crevices and a bony palate where termites get crushed against before swallowing.

Due to this diet the numbat is active during the day which makes it again very usual in comparison to other marsupials in Australia. It had been seen sunbathing but most of the time it searches for food.  By dead trees, decayed logs and subsurface soil are constantly scratched and with its long snout investigated. The moment it discovers some termites they will be scooped up and eaten in no time.

HABITAT

The numbat has its home in scrub wood. Its favourite spot is near a eucalyptus tree. The fallen branches are love by termites and therefore provide a food larder as well. A further use of the eucalyptus tree the hollowed out branches provide shelter for the numbat and many have nest build in with grass and leaves.  The numbat also dig borrows for the night shelter or nest. It has a short tunnel and at the end a chamber filled with leaves and grass. Those burrows are providing refuge. Observation revealed that logs are used in warmer weather while borrows are used in colder nights.  One numbat does use several refuge shelters at any time.

BREEDING

The numbat is a solitary animal using a territory of 100 to 150ha. It mates during the Australian summer months between December and April.  It has tow to four babies but mostly it is four and they are born between January and May. The moment they are born they crawl to the mothers belly and attached themselves to its teat. With nestled deep into the long, warm fur the baby is provided with warmth and food. As they grow they drag on the ground. At four months the mother leaves them in the borrow and suckle them at night.  After six months they start eating termites but stay with the mother till she starts to breed again in December.

PREDATORS

The numbat’s main predator is the carpet snake and certain big lizards. The worst damage is done by foxes, cats, dogs brought in by white settlers in Australia. The only chance to escape the numbat runs up the trees or into a hole blocking the entrance with it s broad back.

Usually the tail is carried upright but when the animals are alarmed or exited it curls it like squirrels

Once widely spread over New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia the habitats are greatly reduced for farming. The numbat is forced into protected area but the numbers of numbats are in decline.

Conservationists have set up breeding colonies and hoping to release the animals into the wild to increase their numbers.