Wild Tasmania

14th April 2011

The main reason Tasmania went straight onto our itinerary was for wildlife. Tonight we’re on the trail of the Tasmanian Devil.

Oh, and I have some errata for yesterday’s post! The critters on the lawn were not wallabies, they were Tasmanian Pademelons. This is a very important distinction and you’d have to admit it’s also a very cute name for a compact little hoppity animal. Later this morning we saw more pademelons in broad daylight at Mount Field National Park, and driving to our accommodation after dark this evening we saw hundreds of them along the roadside. Which explains why we keep seeing so many squashed specimens on the road. These guys are more demented than rabbits when it comes to hopping out in front of cars (I can testify) and yet it seems people aren’t bothered about slowing down after dark.

Last night we also saw an Eastern Quoll when we went for a night drive at Mount Field. This is a spotty little predator very similar to the Western Quoll (aka Chuditch) that we saw in Western Australia. We also saw a Wombat cross the road this evening. He looked like a little cuddly tank. We saw a few Brush-tailed Possums as well, but they’re pretty much everywhere in Australia. Of course all these nocturnal animals are a lot harder to photograph so I’ve got to hope for lucky daylight glimpses if I’m going to show them to you.

One thing we haven’t seen yet is the Duck-billed Platypus, despite Tasmania being the one part of Australia where they are both common and also active in the daytime. We’ve tried three places so far where they’re “often seen” but with no luck. Tomorrow evening our hosts here are going to take us out to a place where platypuses are also often seen. We’ll see. But for tonight we’re on the trail of the iconic Tasmanian Devil.

Not quite on the trail, if I’m honest. That sounds like we’re tramping through the bush in the middle of the night looking for them. We’re actually tucked up in a big wood cabin with an open fire and plenty of hot chocolate, and Len who runs the Mountain Valley Wilderness Cabins has put out offcuts of meat on the veranda and left the outside light on. Our task is just to wait.

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Update: 9:35PM, still waiting.

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Updated update: 11:25PM, still waiting.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, April 16th, 2011 at 3:03 am and is filed under Australia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.