Whitening strikes wombats twice in Ceduna

Last year we brought you the charming tale of an albino wombat rescued in South Australia and left in the care of, well, a wildlife carer. Nicknamed Polar, the ghostly white marsupial was the toast of Ceduna, the small town near where he was found, and proved an internet hit.

Now it turns out lightning, or in this case, whitening, can occur in the same place!

Joining Polar a scant few months later was the imaginatively named Icy.


Val Salmon, who has been rescuing wombats since she was 14, said Icy and Polar were from different families and aged 14-18 months. The two wombats have been nursed back to health, with Polar now weighing 10.75 kilograms, and Icy 10.45 kilograms.

Under South Australian law, rescued wombats cannot be returned to the wild and are usually adopted by zoos or other educational parks after they recover, but some of the rescued animals at Ms Salmon's centre are so badly traumatised no one wants to adopt them.

The centre - which is split between Ms Salmon's half-acre backyard and a 200-acre fauna park - is home to eight wombats, eight joey kangaroos, birds, possums, emus, pet lambs and sheep and many lizards.

Ms Salmon manages the Wombat and Fauna Rescue Centre "off my own bat" and runs a free daily educational talk for tourists that is funded by donations. But she is hoping to get more contributions so she can build up the fauna park and provide a permanent home for all the rescued native animals.

To donate, write to P.O. Box 760, Ceduna SA 5690 or email donval110 AT bigpond.com

Baby wombat found in Ceduna is all white

A rare southern hairy nose wombat, all the rare for being white, has been rescued in Ceduna, Australia, and is recovering under the watchful eye of a wildlife carer after being discovered a month ago near the township alone and in poor condition, close to death.

Nicknamed Polar, the little wombat is now in the care of Val Salmon, an Aussie national wildlife rescuer. Salmon has been rescuing and taking care of wombats for four decades.

Polar isn't the first white wombat to attract the limelight in Australia.

'Stuart Little', as he was christened, was rescued and rehabilitated in care at the Maryknoll Wildlife Centre in Victoria, pictured below with a fellow patient, in 2009.

And there's this historical gem, proving even in the early 1900s white wombats were making an albeit infrequent appearance.

Rare albino whale visits Australian waters

A white whale calf spotted off the Whitsundays coast is believed to be just a few weeks old but it's impossible to tell yet whether the animal is related to Migaloo.

Species expert Mark Read, of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, said without DNA information experts would be unable to link the calf to the other famous white whale.

"We know from basic genetics that this animal could have come from a dark mum and dark father and Wayne Fewings, who took the photograph, said the female was in attendance was a standard dark humpback."

Wayne Fewings captured the white calf on camera while diving near the entrance to Cid Harbour last week.

Mr Fewings, who calls both the Whitsundays and the Gold Coast home, said he and his son's family were in a 4.5m runabout boat when the white calf, believed to be around 4m in length, and two predominantly black adult humpback whales swam towards them.

Orphaned albino echidna gets lucky

In the latest albino wildlife story to cross our desk, little 'Leo' the echidna has landed on his feet after being orphaned and found at Berry on the NSW south coast.

The little monotreme was taken to Symbio Wildlife Park near Wollongong very dehydrated and far too young to be left on his own.

Park staff nursed Leo back to health, feeding him a milk supplement that duplicated his mother's milk.
Leo has since been weaned off the milk formula, sharing meals of termites, lean mince, eggs, insectivore powder and olive oil with his new playmate, Albert.

Wolgan Valley's Albino wallaroos

A rare albino wallaroo has been delighting staff and visitors at the Wolgan Valley Resort and Spa in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney.

"We've had sightings of one mature albino wallaroo on the property since opening 18 months ago, but to have two more spotted on the property is incredibly rare and exciting for us and our guests," the resort's general manager Joost Heymeijer said.

The resort's field guides have noticed the albino wallaroos are more timid and less trusting of humans than their grey brothers and sisters, and wait until it is darker to come out to feed.

The education program co-ordinator at Featherdale Wildlife Park in Doonside, Peter Spradbrow, said albinism is a rare condition where the skin, hair and eyes lack the pigment that gives them colour.

It is observed across many animal species, but in the wild it is difficult for an albino creature to reach adulthood.

For more examples of albino macropods, check out earlier CFZ posts.

Albino kookaburras found in Far North Queensland

We were only just blogging about albino Australian wildlife the other day, so to see this story land in our lap this morning is quite synchronistic!

A pair of never-before-seen blue-winged albino kookaburras, believed to have been swept from their nests in a wild storm, have been rescued by a farmer.

The six-week-old birds, renowned for their laughing cry, were found waterlogged at the base of a tree by a cattle farmer near Ravenshoe, in far northern Queensland, said Harry Kunz from the Eagles Nest Wildlife Sanctuary.

The pink-eyed, pink-beaked and starkly white creatures, thought to be sisters, are the first specimens of their kind ever found in Australia, Kunz said. They are still too young to feed themselves or fly.

"Everybody asks me 'are they rare?' They have never been seen because in nature they would not survive a few days out of the nest because their white colour sticks out and every reptile, owl or predator will get them," Kunz told AFP.

"In the whole of Australia I know there is about three white laughing kookaburras but they are not albino, they have black eyes. For blue wings nobody knows that they exist or can be hatching in this colour."

Wild storms which had recently rocked the area were believed to have swept the unusual chicks from their nests, he added.

Feeding on a diet of small mice, cicadas and moths, the birds were in good health and would be raised at the sanctuary, said Kunz.

"Luckily this farmer found and saved them, they're the real heroes, because probably within the next day they would be dead," he said.

Kunz, founder of the non-profit park, said he was seeking public sponsorship for the birds' care and would offer the rights to name them to the highest bidders.

Usually cream-breasted and bellied with dark brown and blue wings, the kookaburra - a type of kingfisher - is an iconic Australian bird which is best known for its call, which sounds uncannily like human laughter.

Albino macropods no bush myth

Weekly Times reader Malcolm Thompson was driving along the Manangatang-Ouyen Road in Victoria when he spotted this albino kangaroo and friend grazing in a paddock.

"I couldn't believe it," Malcolm said. "I've been knocking around the bush for 40 years and I've never seen a white albino anything, let alone a white albino kangaroo!"

Albino kangaroos and wallabies are not as uncommon as you might think.

In Australia's infancy they were considered to be prized gifts to other countries and frequently shared headlines with world leaders.

The sighting brings to mind the famous meeting between Winston Churchill and 'Digger' the albino kangaroo at London Zoo in 1947.

The CFZ have come across several old clippings about albino kangaroos and wallabies.

We also know Taronga Zoo founder Sir Edward Hallstrom also used to breed albino kangaroos at his property in Sydney, and gifted one to President Truman in 1952 - poor 'roo! Or was it a case of 'hoo-roo'?