| May I add a personal observation? When I worked briefly as a ranger in Canberra Nature Park in 2000, a common task was 'dealing with' roadkill macropods. From memory they were all eastern greys. If an animal was freshly killed and light enough that it could be lifted, I/we put it in the back of the parks ute and drove the carcass to the nearest patch of bushland and laid the animal to rest somewhere out of the way of people, to allow it to decompose there. If the animal was not so fresh, was stinking, maggotty, and/or too heavy to safely lift, we tied the body to the tow bar of the vehicle and dragged it to the said nearby bushland (we had a rope with loops at each end for this purpose). Of course, sometimes we got strange looks from other drivers, some evidently disapproving. To those who did disapprove, I say: well, you try lifting a big heavy roo, so long dead it burnt one's nostrils, and dripping maggots, into the back of a ute, and get it out again in the bush, and later have to clean the vehicle. The gloves one used for this work developed an 'interesting' aroma.
Matthew Higgins On 03/05/2015, at 1:25 PM, Steve Read wrote: I’m not suggesting of course that Wikipedia is anywhere near always correct, but it can be a good pointer to sources of information - although depending on the age of the reference you can need to be a little creative in tracking it down. “During the reporting period, 15 native species have been killed on ACT roads (Figure 1), with brushtail possums the most numerous apart from kangaroos, followed by swamp wallabies and then wombats and wallaroos.” A total of 8 wallaroos were reported killed on ACT roads over that period compared to approximately 1000 kangaroo. The data is from TAMS, but no further reference is given. Either no TAMS data on birds are given, or no birds were reported killed to TAMS.
Steve
From: Mark Clayton [
Sent: Sunday, 3 May 2015 12:28 PM
To: 'Steve Read'; 'Nathanael Coyne'; 'canberrabirds chatline'
Subject: RE: [canberrabirds] Pale-tailed Kangaroo on Black Mountain Nature Reserve, a Rose Robin and some migrating honeyeaters Even that reference is somewhat doubtful. I would suggest that there are more Brush-tailed Possums killed on the roads in the ACT than Wallaroos. Both the macropods are large and their bodies stay visible on the roadsides far longer than something the size of a possum. Another candidate for something that is regularly seen dead on local roads, probably more in the country, is the Short-beaked Echidna. Then of course there are the introduced Rabbit and Red Foxes, not to mention reptiles. In certain areas or at times during the year, there are quite a few birds. We are all aware of them! I don’t always believe what Wikipedia says and on many occasions I have found theta they are wrong. Mark Hi all Steve I would love to be able to cite a source to back up my outrageous claim but it has so far eluded my attempts to find it again. I have however found plenty of research that refutes the claim so I'm guessing wherever I read this was wrong. It's possible that I recalled incorrectly and it may have been more along the lines of "Wallaroos are disproportionately represented in roadkill given their population in comparison to Eastern Greys in the ACT".
I agree with Mark, if that is a fact it would certainly be a surprise. Many road killed EGK and no Wallaroos. In my 30 plus years in ACT I’ve encountered about 2 to 5 Wallaroos. About the original comment, Wallaroos don’t have pale tails, or at least not a identifying feature......... Red Kangaroos do............. Philip Hi Nathan, I would be interested in the source of this claim. I have lived (and driven) in the ACT almost all my life (60+ years) and I would say that for every 1000 Eastern Grey Kangaroos I have seen I would have seen no more that 50 Wallaroos, and that is probably an over estimate. These have mostly been between the Cotter and up towards the Uriarra settlement, west of the Murrumbidgee River, and deep within Namadgi National Park, all in fairly steep and rocky country. In some of the grassland reserves around Gungahlin I have recently seen mobs of up to 200 Eastern Grey Kangaroos but never any Wallaroos. I have probably only ever seen about 10 road killed Wallaroos compared to many hundreds of Eastern Grey Kangaroos. Why anyone would claim what you state is beyond me. Cheers, Mark Surprising fact I learned a few months ago; Wallaroos are killed by cars in Canberra (or perhaps the ACT) more often than Eastern Greys.
I may well be wrong but this looks like a Euro (Wallaroo) to me. It appears too "hairy" for your standard Eastern Grey Kangaroo.
Mark
-----Original Message-----
From: Con Boekel [mailto:m("boekel.com.au","con");" target="_blank" style="color: blue; text-decoration: underline; ">]
Sent: Saturday, 2 May 2015 4:49 PM
To: canberrabirds chatline
Subject: [canberrabirds] Pale-tailed Kangaroo on Black Mountain Nature Reserve, a Rose Robin and some migrating honeyeaters
Not a bird, but someone conversant with macropodic marsupials might know why this one has a pale tail.
There was a female Rose Robin lurking between the electricity substation, the CSIRO workshop and the ANGB plastic house, Frith Road this afternoon. I heard Rose Robin calls on three other occasions but was not sure whether it was the same bird. It was hanging around with a large MFF. There were large parties of honeyeaters (up to 50). Going on the calls alone, White-naped Honeyeaters were in the majority.
Con
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