Australian Reptile Park

Before we left Australia we wanted to make sure we saw a few of the animals Australia is famous for – besides koala and the kangaroo.   We were fortunate to find these in one place at the Australian Reptile Park about 2 hours north of Sydney.

 

One of them is the platypus.  These animals are so strange.   They have fur, they lay eggs, have a duck bill, a beaver tail, the feet of an otter and are venomous.  When they were first discovered the naturalist that sent these back to Europe thought it was an elaborate fraud.   They’re almost impossible to see in the wild because they are nocturnal.  We’ve seen them captivity twice and both times the tanks were dark so it’s really hard to take a picture.  This is one I pulled off the internet. 

Another animal that Australia is famous for is it’s echidna.   They along with the platypus belong to a special animal family called monotreme – egg laying mammals.  These remind me of a small porcupine.  They eat mostly ant and termites.  They must sleep during the day.  We watched them for quite a while and they didn’t even stir.  Here’s the picture of them sleeping.

 

Here’s a better picture from the internet that lets you see their face. 

 

 

 

 

 

We were hoping to make it over to Tasmania to see the Tasmanian Devils but we aren’t going to make it so we were thrilled to find out that the reptile park  had these as well. 

These are really interesting.  They are carnivores but don’t kill to eat.  They eat road kill and other dead animals left behind know as carrion.  They eat everything, bones and all. 

 

 

 

Europeans first gave them their name because their ears are red and glow when light shines through them.  They have a high-pitched shriek when they are scared.   Can you imagine what they must have been thinking when they first came across these guys?

Tasmanian Devils are being wiped out right now by a disease called Devil Facial Tumor Disease.  It’s a type of cancer that spreads across it’s nose and mouth making it impossible to eat.  They eventually starve to death.  It’s estimate that 60% of the devils have died because of the disease.   There are several agencies trying to find a cure for the cancer but it doesn’t seem to be working.  It mutates as fast as they come up with something.  So they’ve changed their approach and basically accepted that the disease will wipe out the devils and they will have to repopulate the island once they’re sure the disease is gone.  This is a better picture of a devil from the internet.

Here’s some other cool animals we saw:

 

Hugo

Galapagos Turtle

He was huge and very friendly. 

 

 

 

 

Dingos

These are beautiful dogs.  Unfortunately, they don’t make good pets.

 

 

 

 

Tawny Owls

We weren’t actually sure this was an owl.  They had them in a cage with other owls that you could walk right up and touch.  They said this was an owl but it didn’t look like any owl we had ever seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These animals were a little creepy.  They are flying foxes or fruit bats.  Again you could walk right into the cage with them.  Several times they stretched out their wings and wrapped themselves up again.  These I for sure don’t want to take home as a pet.   Here’s some better pictures. 

 

 

Of course there were really friendly kangaroos and lizards everywhere.

This is a beaded lizard we got to touch.  His skin feels like tiny beads.  It reminded me of the beadwork done in Order of the Arrow.  Apparently, they are killed for their skin because people want golf shoes made out of them.  Kind of strange.

 

 

 

The park has really gone out of it’s way to make the exhibits appealing.  This is the entrance to reptile world.

 

 

Spider World was really interesting.  They have several spiders that can make you seriously sick and even kill you.  One of them is the funnel web spider which they didn’t have an antidote for till 1981.  That’s amazing!  This exhibit talked about how scary it was to have to go out back and use the privy and not know what spiders were lurking. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a giant funnel web spider.  When it’s about to attack (bite) it rears up on it’s back legs.  In reality it’s about the size of a fifty cent piece. 

 

It was a great day.  We can now check off all the strange Australian animals off our list.  Next stop Sydney.