Some of the other animals in our yard.

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Wollemi
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Some of the other animals in our yard.

Just thought I'd share some of the pics of the kangaroos that visit us daily.

Wollemi

Windhover
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Very cool. Nice to have them and they are common in your area. :)

Amateur

I used to see these quite commonly on the car trip home from school, almost daily either hopping around or lying under the trees. Unfortunately they've decided to start clearing out the area and building houses and I have yet to see them since. You are very lucky to have them in your backyard and see them regularily, I can guarantee that it's something few people in Australia can say!

Wollemi
Wollemi's picture

Amateur,

Yes I am one of the people who can say to the americans who ask. Yes! There are kangaroos in my back yard!

It is so relaxing to just watch them graze and sleep under the gums and just be there so close at hand. My daughter who is disabled walks out and amongst them on her afternoon walks with her carers every day and loves them.

Regards

Wollemi

Araminta
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Wollemi and Amateur, Send the Americans over to my place, ( on second thought, maybe not?).I have Kangaroos,Goannas,Snakes and Koalas and lots of other animals in my backyard .

M-L

wolfy
wolfy's picture

These guys are regular nightly visitors, and when they fight they can be as loud as cats. At least they seem to keep the cats away at night at least.

_______________

I love photography.

Araminta
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Wow, what a fantastic photo!! We get Koalas fighting out the back sometimes. During the mating season, the noise they make is amazing.A bit like grumpy old lions fighting.

M-L

birdie
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Great shot Wolfy.... isn't he/she beautiful?

I heard lots of Possum Love going on in my back yard last night too :)

Sunshine Coast Queensland

Windhover
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Wolfy, don't for a minute believe that Brushtail Possums keep cats away! As a wildlife carer it amazes me how many come into care due to being attacked by cats! :) And night is when most cats would prowl around anyway!

wolfy
wolfy's picture

I have no illusions about cats attacking possums, but we have a few in the creek out back living in a couple large palm trees behind the fence. The neighbour has a cat that hunts, and it has made my backyard its territory it seems.

But one night the cat decided to stalk one of the young possums, before I could shoo it away, a large adult possum raced out and I tell you that cat came out decidedly second best. Since then I havent seen that cat prowl at night if the possums are traveling.

Back on the farm we had cats to control mice and rats, and with a bit of early rewards training, they soon learned hunting mice or rats got them the rewards. One particular cat even got the odd rabbit (would bring it back to us to have it skinned) and once even caught a possum. But till that night I didnt know that possums could be so aggressive or even that damn quick.

_______________

I love photography.

Windhover
Windhover's picture

They are very aggressive, despite the cute faces. :) I can assure you of that. I would think that each will have their own personality (as would cats) so while some may escape unscathed for their ferocity towards a would be predator, many (most likely far more) would end up getting injured or killed. Especially the younger, less experienced. It's a pity about the cats....but they just do what they do best. And people should be responsible enough to at least lock them indoors at night. :)

Cheers :)

cooee
cooee's picture

I am not that lucky as to have kangaroos in my backyard, probably not possums either, in fact, no animal like that enters my yard. I have a lot of these western blue tongue lizards that run around. Not the little skink ones, the BIG ones!Im probably overstating them but there still very fascinating. Unfortunately, there was one that was living in our compast for years that had only three legs due to the neighbours cat. The lizard is now gone... he took a lot of snails with him though!

abeleski
abeleski's picture

When somebody mentions possums it takes me back to my experience at the University of Wollongong where I am an on call engineer for the IT department. This goes back a few years back now.

I got an automatic page alert at about 2am that some of our networking gear was down. I was unable to fix the issue remotely so I went on site to investigate. The networking equipment that was showing as being at fault was in a communications closet in one of our buildings. Closet is probably a 2m x 2.5m room. Inside there is what is called a rack in which all the equipment is installed.

First thing I noticed was an unusual smell and little brown bits all over the floor and around the place but didn't pay too much attention as these closets are always dusty and dirty. Rarely does anybody venture into one once the stuff is installed unless there is a problem. Well there was a problem now and I was there investigating.

I noticed there was power to other devices so I knew it wasn't a power issue. I had to slide my body behind the rack so I was sandwiched between the rack and the wall inspecting all the cables and leads. I noticed that the problematic switch had its power cable unplugged hanging loosely and some fibre optic cable had also been cut off.

This I thought was very strange. Cables don't just pull themselves out in the middle of the night. So I am looking around, its 2am and i am half asleep, trying to work out whats wrong and then i focused on two eyes looking at me and my heart exploded. There was a possum about 3inches from my face. I didn't know it was a possum right away, i am sandiwched between the rack with this thing right in front of my nose and a wall behind me. I almost had a heart attack.

Ends up that this silly possum had come into the comms room through a roof tile and had trapped himself in there. That explained all the droppings and the urine which was all over the equipment and floor etc. The poor possum was starving and dehydrated. He managed to save himself by disabling some of the equipment or he could have died there. God knows how long he was there for.

Anyway I captured some images and video on my mobile. This goes a while back so the images arent great. Technology back then wasnt what it is now. I thought I would share the experience.

https://picasaweb.google.com/abeleski/ThePossumNerd#

Oh yeah, he scratched me so I had to get a tetnus shot which hurt like hell.

I was born to live and I live to die.

edward
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Here are some of the animals in our shed! It's echidna mating season at the moment and these three managed to make a real mess. Lucky they didn't hurt themselves as they knocked over shovels, rakes and sledge hammers and almost dug under a large set of shelves.

birdie
birdie's picture

HOw lovely Edward and it is great to see you drop in again! My neighbour took a video of our resident echidna by the creek yesterday and it was great to see also :)

Sunshine Coast Queensland

Araminta
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Wow Edward,violent mating rituals in your shed??? I wonder which one used the shovel,the girl to defend herself, or the boy......? LOL
Good to see,you have them. We have one huge echidna, she(?) has been coming for many years now. She drinks out of the dog bowl, (just like the Goannas and snakes do), and wanders off. Aren't we lucky???

M-L

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