January 21 - Pictures from Australia

I feel as if I am still playing catch up as I write this post, but I did want to share with you these pictures from Australia. You might recall that when we were there I had a few technical difficulties, and so after our amazing visit to The Reptile Park just north of Sydney I wasn’t able to post pictures. Well, difficulties are solved and the pictures are here now:

 

This is the echidna. It had escaped from its enclosure and was wandering along the top of the low fence. The echidna was the approximate size of a football, dark brown in colour, and when we saw it; its spiky back was up. I think that it was feeling some distress at being outside of its regular enclosure.

Jen was able to take this picture of a cute, cuddly, grey koala from quite close up.  Its head is facing the camera. Baby koalas have an interesting diet. They begin life with mother’s milk, and then progress to mother’s feces before nibbling on the tender but toxic gum leaves. Koalas are protected and in New South Wales it is illegal for anyone other than a zoo or wildlife keeper to pick up and hold a koala.

 
Did you know that a group of kangaroos together is called a troop? Following is a picture of four kangaroos lazily munching on the grass in the open area where we were able to pat them.

I like this picture of the Tasmanian Devil.  I couldn’t see this animal clearly in real life because it moved way too quickly for my eyes to focus on it. However, the picture shows it to be dark brown, almost black in colour with black beady eyes.  It has a bit of a peculiar shape with a thick, squat body and a fairly large weasel-like head. The front legs are a little longer than the back legs and it has a long tail, which it uses for balance – a little like a kangaroo does. The picture is taken side on and you can see most of these features.

My thanks to Jen for all these pictures.  The pictures are from her camera.