Monday, November 20, 2006
10th November A Very Zoological Day
10th November (Friday)
Zoo and Phillip Island
Today we visited Melbourne Zoo and met Jon’s friends Richard and Angela there too. It is not a big zoo and I believe it has been criticised in the past for not giving enough space nor the right environment for the animals to thrive and flourish successfully. However they seem to be putting that right currently. There are 3 new Asian elephant arrivals who have just gone on show this week and who have 3 new enclosures, one by their elephant house with play area and mud bath, another larger roaming compound and finally an area with a huge swimming and bathing pool. Looked more like an elephant Jacuzzi. Then there were new orang-utans who also have a new housing area, indoor play area and outside area all with many play items and climbing rooms. They even had blankets and clothes to play with. The pathways around and leading to enclosures have all been planted with bamboos and tall grasses to give a feeling of jungle and is quite effective. Much better than open walks and wood or steel fences. Wandered through the butterfly house and saw many varieties and asked the zoo keeper why she was tipping out baby stick insects onto the bushes and flowers. They were the babies that were not needed by the zoo for the insect house and so were released into the butterfly house as food for the Sun birds who were also housed there. We then headed for the indigenous Australian species paddock and saw lazy kangaroos, red kangaroos, wombats, platypus, koala, which is not a bear but a marsupial, Echidnae which is a large hedgehog with a very long snout (also known as spiny anteater) and emus. Been told a story that koalas are actually permanently stoned because of their diet of eucalyptus leaves. Jon said be careful because the drop out of trees and injure people, he calls them drop bears! Not sure if he’s pulling my leg or not. After a brief lunch we continued and saw little penguins, a beautiful red tree bear, lions, tortoises, reptile house and least rare of beasts, the Souvenir shop.
Left the zoo for the city to catch the Little Penguin Express coach to go and visit Phillip Island and the nightly penguin parade. My thanks to Richard and Angela for some excellent background info regarding the zoo and its inhabitants. The zoo also offers sleepovers to kids in the grounds. Wonder how many actually sleep.
Well, we’re off on the 2 hour coach journey to Phillip Island to witness, what I’ve been frequently told, is the highlight of any visit to Melbourne. How exciting can the walk of some penguins across a beach be, I thought. Nightly, little penguins leave the ocean to make their way across a long beach and up a grassy hill to their burrows where their mate and offspring are waiting for supper. The journey is hazardous because being only 12 inches in height they are the target of predators such as birds and sharks and land creatures including cats and dogs. But the biggest menace to them was, as usual, man because since time immemorial visitors have gone to the island to watch them come ashore. What wasn’t understood up until the ’70’s was that walking over the dunes more often than not crushed their burrows and would often bury penguins and their babies inside. Aside from that, the presence of humans put off the penguins from returning to certain parts of the nesting coastline and for many years the colony numbers where known to be decreasing. Currently they believe there are 60,000 or so. It is now a full time sanctuary as well as a tourist destination but it is controlled tourism and the penguins are the most important part of the equation. Viewing areas which are elevated above the pingwin pathways have been built using tourist income, rangers are employed and full time vets are on hand each evening in case of pingwin injury. On the night we were there one was rescued with a foot injury and packed up and sent to the vet.
It is truly a marvellous spectacle watching the little fellas waddle up the long beach in the twilight gloom, in gaggles of 30 or so. It’s not until you are there that you understand the distance they have to walk on their short little legs. Pingwins are designed to swim, not walk. They reach the grassy area and have a rest before the uphill journey towards their burrows. The noise of the waiting babies and partners is quite loud and often partners will venture out of the burrow and back toward the beach in search of hubby or wife. The rangers told us that the journey is also a social event where everybody catches up on the gossip because generally they spend up to 3 or 4 months at sea fishing and eating. They only return to land to mate and rear their young. Needless to say we saw some having pingwin nookie! It was pretty much all over within an hour (the pingwin parade not the nooky) and we all embarked on our coaches and drove back to Melbourne. No photos as it is prohibited, even non flash photography. As much to protect the income of the sanctuary through the sale of photographic souvenirs as the protection of the pingwins.
Zoo and Phillip Island
Today we visited Melbourne Zoo and met Jon’s friends Richard and Angela there too. It is not a big zoo and I believe it has been criticised in the past for not giving enough space nor the right environment for the animals to thrive and flourish successfully. However they seem to be putting that right currently. There are 3 new Asian elephant arrivals who have just gone on show this week and who have 3 new enclosures, one by their elephant house with play area and mud bath, another larger roaming compound and finally an area with a huge swimming and bathing pool. Looked more like an elephant Jacuzzi. Then there were new orang-utans who also have a new housing area, indoor play area and outside area all with many play items and climbing rooms. They even had blankets and clothes to play with. The pathways around and leading to enclosures have all been planted with bamboos and tall grasses to give a feeling of jungle and is quite effective. Much better than open walks and wood or steel fences. Wandered through the butterfly house and saw many varieties and asked the zoo keeper why she was tipping out baby stick insects onto the bushes and flowers. They were the babies that were not needed by the zoo for the insect house and so were released into the butterfly house as food for the Sun birds who were also housed there. We then headed for the indigenous Australian species paddock and saw lazy kangaroos, red kangaroos, wombats, platypus, koala, which is not a bear but a marsupial, Echidnae which is a large hedgehog with a very long snout (also known as spiny anteater) and emus. Been told a story that koalas are actually permanently stoned because of their diet of eucalyptus leaves. Jon said be careful because the drop out of trees and injure people, he calls them drop bears! Not sure if he’s pulling my leg or not. After a brief lunch we continued and saw little penguins, a beautiful red tree bear, lions, tortoises, reptile house and least rare of beasts, the Souvenir shop.
Left the zoo for the city to catch the Little Penguin Express coach to go and visit Phillip Island and the nightly penguin parade. My thanks to Richard and Angela for some excellent background info regarding the zoo and its inhabitants. The zoo also offers sleepovers to kids in the grounds. Wonder how many actually sleep.
Well, we’re off on the 2 hour coach journey to Phillip Island to witness, what I’ve been frequently told, is the highlight of any visit to Melbourne. How exciting can the walk of some penguins across a beach be, I thought. Nightly, little penguins leave the ocean to make their way across a long beach and up a grassy hill to their burrows where their mate and offspring are waiting for supper. The journey is hazardous because being only 12 inches in height they are the target of predators such as birds and sharks and land creatures including cats and dogs. But the biggest menace to them was, as usual, man because since time immemorial visitors have gone to the island to watch them come ashore. What wasn’t understood up until the ’70’s was that walking over the dunes more often than not crushed their burrows and would often bury penguins and their babies inside. Aside from that, the presence of humans put off the penguins from returning to certain parts of the nesting coastline and for many years the colony numbers where known to be decreasing. Currently they believe there are 60,000 or so. It is now a full time sanctuary as well as a tourist destination but it is controlled tourism and the penguins are the most important part of the equation. Viewing areas which are elevated above the pingwin pathways have been built using tourist income, rangers are employed and full time vets are on hand each evening in case of pingwin injury. On the night we were there one was rescued with a foot injury and packed up and sent to the vet.
It is truly a marvellous spectacle watching the little fellas waddle up the long beach in the twilight gloom, in gaggles of 30 or so. It’s not until you are there that you understand the distance they have to walk on their short little legs. Pingwins are designed to swim, not walk. They reach the grassy area and have a rest before the uphill journey towards their burrows. The noise of the waiting babies and partners is quite loud and often partners will venture out of the burrow and back toward the beach in search of hubby or wife. The rangers told us that the journey is also a social event where everybody catches up on the gossip because generally they spend up to 3 or 4 months at sea fishing and eating. They only return to land to mate and rear their young. Needless to say we saw some having pingwin nookie! It was pretty much all over within an hour (the pingwin parade not the nooky) and we all embarked on our coaches and drove back to Melbourne. No photos as it is prohibited, even non flash photography. As much to protect the income of the sanctuary through the sale of photographic souvenirs as the protection of the pingwins.
# posted by desmond22 @ 11:02 pm 
