OOPA: UK wallaby sighting delights and surprises

Well I’ll be! A wallaby who hopped its way down a farm track in Pluckley is now set to become a YouTube hit, according to Kent Online.A 14-second film clip was taken by village resident Alex Pooley who caught the cheeky creature on camera as she walked her dog Shackleton, two.
The 29-year-old said: “We were in a field near the train station and I saw what I thought was a giant hare, but then it moved and started hopping.

“I was a bit surprised to say the least and the dog was off the lead at the time and he went off to investigate. They ran around for a couple of minutes and then he came back and I put him on the lead.
“Then I saw it hopping down the path towards us. It seemed pretty friendly and quite intrigued because it came right up to us.”
Grabbing her mobile phone, teacher Alex managed to film the animal before it once again hopped off.
Wallabies are generally found in Australia though have been spotted in the UK including areas of Devon and East Sussex.
In 2009 a ghost hunting trip to Pluckley that ended up with a family being spooked by a wallaby (pictured above).

Mum Mandy Page took daughters Sophie and Lauren for a bit of spirit spotting in November. But instead of a headless horseman, they found a wallaby staring back at them.
The month before that, commuter Ula Griggs encountered a wallaby crossing the road. The stunned motorist saw it bounce across at Bell Lane, just outside Pluckley.
In 2005 a wallaby (pictured left) was hit by motorist Kate Scorey at the Texaco garage, A20 outside Lenham as she was driving home in the dark.
In September 2008, a wallaby was spotted on Magpie Hall Road in Stubbs Cross. It was believed to be Wesley, a wallaby that had escaped from a farm eight years before and was frequently glimpsed around the area.
The creatures have a life expectancy of about 18 years.

OOPA: Gotcha! Wallaby caught in the UK

CFZ US blogger Nick Redfern has a great post about an out of place animal - a wallaby - on the hop in Dorset in the UK. It's not the first British wallaby that's been featured on this blog (we featured a mother and joey bouncing around Cornwall last month) and no doubt it won't be the last.

As Nick relates, there are a number of interesting stories relative to how and why they are here - but nothing too mysterious. You can read his musings about OOPAs in general here.

This hapless macropod has however since been caught and is destined for a life in a wildlife park in Exminster, Devon.

OOPA: Wallaby with joey spotted in Cornwall

The UK's Telegraph newspaper has reported the discovery of an OOPA - out-of-place-animal - in Cornwall, in the country's west.

Homeowner Brian Nash, 39, provided the best possible proof of his claims that a wallaby was on the loose with a photograph of a mother macropod hopping around a neighbour's lawn with her joey tucked into her pouch.

It is believe the female mated with a male which escaped from a nearby farm in 2007 but was never re-captured. Experts say wallabies are "renowned" for being able to find each other in the wild and it is thought the pair have begun breeding.

The male escaped two years ago from Trevathan Farm near St Endellion.

Owner Mark Symons said: "We lost a male wallaby two years ago and wondered what happened to him. They are very tough creatures and will certainly still be alive.

"He is a healthy boy and will eat anything and would be more than capable of surviving for years yet.

"The chances are he found a mate, a female that also escaped from somewhere."

London's Grant Museum re-opens its doors

Anyone travelling to the UK should go out of their way to visit the Grant Museum of Zoology, a time capsule of more than 62,000 specimens of insects and animals, some of them extinct.

Sadly it was closed when we were in London last, as its custodians moved premises and used the opportunity to search through the extensive collection.

This month the Grant re-opens its doors and resumes hosting its interesting program of talks and other events during the year.

The museum began life in the 1820s, founded by zoologist Robert Grant. The collection was (and still is) used for teaching students at University College London.

Highlights include:

- (Recently rediscovered) Dodo bones. A member of the pigeon family, the Dodo was a flightless bird that has been extinct for some 300 years. The 'new' bones found during the move are pictured above.

- a Quagga skeleton. A Quagga is a kind of zebra that could once be found in South Africa. Sadly, this unique creature was hunted to extinction in the 1870s.

- a Tasmanian Tiger skeleton. Once found throughout Australia and New Guinea, this animal died out in the 1930s. It was once considered a pest and hunted heavily. When it was noticed that its numbers were fast dwindling, a law was passed to protect them, but by then it was too late.

Need we say more? Get thee to the Grant!