Scientific name: Macropus Family: Macropodidae Classification: Mammal IUCN status: Least Concern Lifespan (in wild): Up to 23 years Weight: Around 90kg Body size: Over 2m in height Top speed: 56km/h Diet: Herbivore – mainly grasses Habitat: Australian deserts and grasslands
Kangaroos belong to the animal family Macropodidae, which literally means ‘bigfoot.’ Thanks to their large feet and powerful hind legs, kangaroos can travel more than 56km/h and leap more than 9m in a single bound – that’s more than six ten-year-olds lying head to toe! They have small front legs and a long, strong tail which helps them balance while jumping. The tallest of all our planet’s marsupials, these amazing animals can stand over two meters tall. ?
Kangaroos are found in Eastern Australia, where they live in small groups called troops or herds (or ‘mobs’ by Australians), typically made up of 50 or more animals. If threatened, kangaroos pound the ground with their strong feet to alert and warn the others in the group. And these cool creatures aren’t to be messed with – when they fight, they punch and kick with powerful blows, and will sometimes even bite. Males will often fight each other over access to females.
Female kangaroos sport a pouch on their belly (made by a fold in the skin) to cradle baby kangaroos, called joeys. Newborn joeys are tiny, measuring just 2.5 centimeters, or about the size of a grape – cute! After birth, joeys travel unassisted through their mother’s thick fur to the comfort and safety of the pouch. A newborn can’t suckle or swallow, so the kangaroo mum uses her muscles to pump milk down its throat. At around 4 months, the youngster emerges from the pouch for short trips, and at ten months, it’s mature enough to leave the pouch for good.
Kangaroos are herbivores and like to chew on grasses, herbs, and shrubs. Besides humans and wild dogs called dingoes, kangaroos face few natural predators. But that’s not to say that these guys have it easy. Heat, drought, and hunger due to vanishing habitat are amongst the dangers these amazing marsupials face.
Kangaroos as Pets: Cute or Cruel?
Kangaroos as pets? Terrible idea — especially if your property is nothing like their natural habitat. Here’s why keeping kangaroos as pets are bad news.
The Kangaroo Protection Coalition says kangaroos can succumb easily to stress-related diseases.
A family in Alabama was on the news for keeping not 1 but 3 kangaroos as pets in their home.
Rolando and Roxie, 6-month-old red kangaroos, were bred in Texas. She was a 3-month-old kangaroo bred in Ohio.
The family dressed them in cute little T-shirts and treated their pet kangaroos just as they would pet dogs or cats — they even took them out to events in the community.
According to ABC affiliate WAAY-TV reporter Kyle Burger, the kangaroos lived in the barn but spent a good deal of time in the house — which was alarming to anyone familiar with the risks of keeping kangaroos as pets.
“They can be very large — they can leap 25 feet long, 6 feet high,” said one of the family members. “So they can cover a lot of ground at 40 to 45 miles per hour in speed when they’re running.”
Kangaroos Need Lots of Space
Because kangaroos enjoy having a lot of space to boing-boing around in, they might not be the best choice of pets — no matter how cute they are in their little T-shirts and diapers or how much they love their families.
According to the Kangaroo Protection Coalition:
“In the United States and Canada, red and grey kangaroos are also bred for pets, and for sale to zoos and wildlife parks. Reports we receive indicate that the death toll is very high amongst these animals, as quite often they are restrained in small yards. Few overseas veterinarians know anything about them, and macropods do succumb very easily to stress-related diseases.
Wallabies and kangaroos cannot be house-trained, nor should they mix with domestic animals; they can catch diseases off them. Wallabies and kangaroos need a very big grassed area to live in, and company of their own kind.”
The Cost of Kangaroos as Pets
Although the news report didn’t say how much the family paid for their 3 marsupials, males kangaroos usually cost around $2,000 and females go for $3,000.
Male kangaroos often fight among themselves for mating rights. Photo: francesco_veronesi
Just How Dangerous Are Kangaroos to People and Pets?
Although many of us know a few basic facts about kangaroos — they’re in Australia, they hop and they carry their young in pouches — we struggle to come up with anything deeper concerning kangaroos.
With that being the case, let’s take an in-depth look at this animal.
Kangaroo Background
According to the National Museum of Australia, kangaroos were “discovered” by Europeans when Captain Cook of the HMB Endeavor returned to England in 1771.
In a few short years, the kangaroo came to epitomize the Australian continent, appearing on currency, stamps, and logos.
But kangaroos had been around a lot longer than that. In Kangaroos: Biology of the Largest Marsupials, author Terence J. Dawson explains:
“The extensive radiations of the kangaroos and their relatives accompanied the drying out of Australia and the spread of grasslands. This process was well underway by 4–5 million years ago, in the Pliocene period, when the first species clearly related to the modern gray kangaroos and wallaroos began to appear in the fossil record.”
Kangaroos today — including the red kangaroo, antilopine kangaroo, eastern and western gray kangaroos — are similar to their ancestors, though a bit smaller.
For example, one ancestor was called the Macropus Titan.
A giant kangaroo? Yikes — let’s just say we’re glad we’re alive now and not then.
Baby kangaroos spend around 230 days in their mother’s pouch after birth. Kangaroo Society
Kangaroos tend to gather in groups called “aggregations.”
Think of this as being like a human family unit:
These aggregations will often come together in larger groups, aptly called “mobs.”
For us, it would be like several families joining together for a holiday party.
The purpose of all this socializing is for safety. Many kangaroos working together can more easily spot a predator.
Again, like human families, kangaroos can exist harmoniously or aggressively.
Laid-back roos will engage in patting or stroking each other’s noses or faces, mutual grooming and stroking a female’s pouch. Many younger kangaroos will also play-fight, much like young kittens or puppies who engage in wrestling matches.
When kangaroos really fight about things like mating rights, it can be dangerous and deadly.
National Geographic’s video demonstrates just how hardcore these animals are when they battle. Their real weapons are their extremely strong legs and feet, capable of disemboweling or even killing their opponent.
Kangaroo Kids
Kangaroos have a short gestation period.
After the egg is fertilized, the baby roo is born 30–45 days later, and they’ll be only a few centimeters long. Their hind legs won’t be fully developed yet, but they’ll use their stronger front legs to climb into their mother’s pouch.
No comments:
Post a Comment