Video Diary

This little fella is Bellevue Bill. He's pretty sick the poor thing, but you wouldn't know to look at him. He eats all his leaves enthusiastically and always sniffs you when you come in - like he does to the camera here. Listen closely to hear him chewing away.

Bill is Tracy's favourite koala and we're all rooting for him to pull through.

33! And travel plans...

My birthday was ace, including a wander through rainforest and beaches and unexpected drinks (cheers, Hazel!), and I want to thank everyone who adopted koalas to mark the occasion! I was interested to note that Nick and Lib both adopted Hill Wrigglepot. What a name!!! Cheers, everyone. I'm happy to be 33; it's an easy age to remember!

We leave Port Macquarie tomorrow (2/5), and I can't believe that April is over. We've had such a wonderful experience at the Koala Hospital. The koalas are gorgeous, and the people working/volunteering there have been so lovely to us. They've welcomed us as a part of the team, and some of them have really taken us under their wings (namely Mary, Joyce and Brian -- thanks for the Sunday parties!), having us over for dinner or drinks and showing us around the area. We will really treasure our Koala Hospital memories and hope to return there someday!

Although I'll miss it here, I'm looking forward to seeing some new stuff. We've bought 10,000 km Greyhound bus passes to get us around Oz (plus we'll take a train at some points). We're going to work our way clockwise around the country, with a stop in Adelaide to go inland to Alice Springs and back. Here's where we plan to be during the next three months:

Katoomba in the Blue Mountains
Sydney and surrounds
A 3-day train journey from Sydney to Perth (in pieces as we stop along the way)
Adelaide
Alice Springs, Uluru and everything else around there
Coober Pedy
Perth, Rottnest Island and Margaret River area
Nambung National Park (stromatolites!)
Kalbarri National Park
Shark Bay
Coral Bay and Exmouth (whale sharks!)
Broome
The Kimberley
Darwin
Kakadu National Park
Litchfield National Park
Devil's Marbles
Townsville
Queensland (will see what all we've got time for once we get there)
Anything else in New South Wales that we have time for
We'll wind up back in Sydney to get a ship to New Zealand in early August.

That's the plan for now...we'll see how it all winds up. It'll be cool to get back into travel and hostel mode. We've had a whole month in the same place, staying in a wee cabin. We've saved a lot of money during our time here, so now we get to see our bank balance shrink rapidly! It's all good, though. We're loving it all!

More soon,
Trace

Koalas part III

Yet more koalas:

Lookout Harry



Kempsey Carolina



Wiruna Lucky



Ellenbourgh Nancy



Ocean Roy



Innes Tony



Oceanview Terry



Tractive Golfer



Ocean Kim

More Koalas

To continue my "Koala Gallery", here is installment number two:

Belleview Bill



Walcha Barbie



Birthday Girl



Lookout Harry



Oxley Jo

Photo Gallery

Before we leave the hospital, I want to get photos of as many residents as I can. Here's the first batch:

Anna Bay Miles




Siren Gem




Morrish Steven

Recent events

G'day once again from down under.

Well, all has been relatively busy here in good old Australia. Since the last post we've had Anzac day and Trace's birthday (I'll let Trace fill you in herself). We've also been invited out for dinner twice and strolled around a rainforest.

Furthermore we've managed to spot a few more examples of Aussie wildlife. Below is a blue tongued lizard.


We also managed to spot a Tawny Frogmouth - but he's way up in a tree and too far away for a photo.

As I walked into the hospital the other day I was surprised to find Anna Bay Miles had climbed up onto his roof. I managed to coax him down a pole onto the ground, but next time I looked he'd gone up again. It was a bit of a "Mission Impossible" feat, but he seems to enjoy it up there, so we left him to it this time.

He also seemed to inspire Linksie to follow his example:


As I was feeding Siren Gem this morning I found a tick on his face. Ticks are pretty horrible things. Although they are not known to spread disease in koalas, they do suck blood and can cause anaemia if too many of them attach themselves to a single koala. The thing was big and fat as it was so full of blood.

Any ticks we find get archived away for Sydney Uni vets to have a look at. Finding one always makes me itch all over...

Hospitality

Welcome to my new batch of cute, cuddly koala pics. Below is Sandfly Jye sitting on the ground like yoda (thanks Sam). Also Tracy feeding Siren Gem.


We took a rare day off to have a look around Port. On previous visits we noticed a few bats flying around and went to have a look for them. What we found was an entire colony.


The bats are a bit of a local nuisance, but I reckon they're pretty cool.

Here are some photos of a couple of joeys. Koalas are usually pretty antisocial so they are usually kept separate - but when they are young, they are sometimes put together so they can learn off each other.


Finally, here's a photo of a huge spider we saw on the way home. She was building a big fat web. The web was practically invisible, so it looked like she was floating in mid-air. Luckily non-venomous - I believe so anyway...

Iff > David Attenbourgh

Today I took the Port Macquarie koala hospital "walk and talk". I told everyone all I know about koalas and everyone was well impressed. I didn't even need to check my notes or anything!

Feeding a Koala

Here's me feeding the wee koala (a boy named Siren Gem) I posted about recently:


You can see him leaning towards me anxiously while I'm refilling the syringe...he absolutely loves the formula and is so greedy! When I fed him again later that day, he was so greedy he kept grabbing the syringe. He wound up scratching me when he did that, so I just let go of the syringe each time he grabbed it. He'd then hold the syringe in his mouth, sucking on it and not understanding why no formula was coming out. Cute! You can also notice in the video that I only release a little amount of formula at a time. (It takes a while to give him all 50ml!) He's only wee, and he'd make a mess if he took too much formula in too quickly (or, worse, he could choke on it). Try telling him that, though! It's why he kept grabbing the syringe!

Another cute koala moment happened recently. I was feeding Kempsey Carolina, a much older koala. She's one of the hospital's few permanent residents because she's missing one eye and is blind in the eye she has. She uses her sense of smell to make up for the lack of vision. (Whenever I go into her enclosure, I approach her gently and let her sniff my hat so she's aware someone is in there.) I was feeding her, and suddenly she lost interest in the formula (unusual for her). She let go of the syringe and started sniffing my hand delicately (very ladylike!). She then sniffed her way along my wrist and arm up to my elbow, then was sniffing her way back down my arm when she decided to take a wee nibble above my wrist! She didn't hurt me at all, but I automatically took my arm away. I reckon she fancies my sunblock, but Iff thinks she smelled leaves on me from when I was putting new food in for koalas that morning! Who knows, but it was so cute to feel her smooth nose on my arm and then the gentle nibble! Too cute!!!

Open day and other such happenings...

Ello.

So April 7th was the hospital's open day! There were stalls, a BBQ and a huge koala suit. Luckily I was spared the koala suit - although Victoria who did end up in the suit did get her picture in the local paper (but then noone could tell it was her anyway, so bleah.


A good time was had by all and we did raise over AUS$5000 for the hospital so that worked out OK.



So - here's what we spend most of our time here doing: we go to the hospital twice a day to look after our furry charges. Their pens are swept and newspaper put down (if they are inside):


They then have to be given fresh leaves to eat. Some young or sick koalas have to be hand fed with milk formula.


Then in the afternoon, we just have to repeat the feeding for any who need formula twice daily and make sure that the leaves are moist. Koalas don't drink water, but they do need to get water from the leaves that they eat so we help them by watering the leaves.

Today we were able to go out to rescue a lost koala. We managed to pry her down from a tree in a playground in Dunbogan after she was found wondering around on the ground near some dangerous roads. We go her back to the hospital and checked her out. In honour of the help we gave in rescuing the poor thing, the koala was named Dunbogan Tracy! After a quick checkup, we found she was fine so she'll be released tomorrow somewhere a little safer.


For those bird brains back home, here's a hospital visitor of the winged kind:

Wee Joey

This morning I fed a wee joey! She's the cutest little thing, and I'm sorry I don't have a picture of her to include here. She gets fed some formula each morning if she comes down for it (if she stays up in the tree they don't give her the formula, in which case she just eats leaves that day). I was cleaning out her enclosure with another volunteer, and as soon as she saw us she climbed down the tree, anxious for the formula. Some of the koalas really love the stuff; even if they don't strictly need the extra nutrients in the formula, they can have it if they like it. So down she climbed, and she kept leaning towards each of us, stretching out a wee arm (with big claws) towards us and nearly falling off her perch in the process. This little girl was hungry! Luckily the other (more experienced) volunteer let me feed her, and it was just thrilling. She was so eager for it, she kept trying to reach out and pull my hand to her more quickly! We use a wee syringe to feed the koalas, releasing the formula quite slowly to prevent it from going down the wrong way (feeding them too fast can cause the formula to get into the lungs, which can wind up killing the koala). I was following the procedure, but she was very impatient. She didn't get me with her claws but did manage to hook them into the small cloth I was holding to wipe any formula off her chin after she was done eating. She wasn't too keen on me wiping her face after she ate, but it had to be done!

I love these koalas. I so wish they didn't need to be in a hospital, but as long as they're there, I'm so happy to be helping them. Our time here means so much to me.

Port Macquarie

We arrived in Port Macquarie ("Port" from now on...) on the 31st of March after passing through Sydney (and passing over the harbour bridge - right next to the opera house). The next morning we started work at the local koala hospital. So far we have been involved in feeding, watering and (of course) cleaning out the koalas. The residents at the zoo range from short term rescues (koalas who have been removed from people's gardens and just need a quick check-up before release), to sick koalas (usually eye infections or "wet bot" - a symptom of chlamydia), through to long term residents (who are unable to return to the wild due to serious injury).

I've already had a koala try to scratch and bite me - not a pleasant experience given that they have pretty big claws! Luckily the local volunteer I was with showed Nancy who was boss! Not me obviously...

Today we went with a couple of local volunteers to release a couple of rehabilitated residents back into the wild.


This little guy was our second release. He disappeared up a tree as soon as we let him out of the bag.



We have another month here before we move on - hopefully there will be more good news like these two.

As soon as we make some new plans, this will be the first place you will see them!