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Home , Kangaroo, Macropus, Tammar wallaby, Wallaby

Tammar ( eugenii decres) Life in the thickets

Tammar have a dark grey coat, grading to reddish brown on the sides of the body. Their habitat on Island ranges from coastal scrub to eucalypt forest and woodland. Usually very timid , they rest in dense vegetation during the day. Around dusk the animals move quietly out into open grassy clearings to feed. They use regular runs, forming a series of tunnels through the undergrowth, travelling up to a kilometre or so from their daytime shelters.

While several wallabies often feed in the same area, they do not form social groups except for females and young.

Radio-tracking studies have revealed that each wallaby has Macros = large; pus = foot; eugenii = L’Isle Eugene (where a well-defined home range that overlaps with that of first collected); decres = L’Isle Decres several others.

( as named by Nicolas Baudin) The is a , with a preference for herbs and grasses, but it also browses on the leaves of History of the Tammar wallaby some shrubs (e.g. Coastal boobialla Myoporum insulare).

There were once three subspecies of this small wallaby: Macropus eugenii eugenii on mainland South ; Macropus eugenii derbianus in and A Remarkable Life Cycle Macropus eugenii decres on Kangaroo Island. At the time that this small wallaby was first collected wallabies of several species ‘…swarmed in scrub-covered districts all over the state.’

Today only the Kangaroo Island Tammar wallaby population is abundant, benefiting from both an absence of foxes and plentiful ideal habitat - dense bushland adjacent to farm (pasture or crops).

Macropus eugenii eugenii (from mainland ) was considered extinct by the 1920s, due to extensive habitat clearance and fox . However, recently rediscovered as a surviving introduced population on a As a result of research studies, mainly using captive island, it is now being re-introduced to South colonies derived from Kangaroo Island stock, much is Australia. Macropus eugenii derbianus survives in Western known about the reproductive mechanisms of Tammar Australia only where fox numbers are controlled. wallabies.

After giving in late January to March, the female mates again. The resultant lies dormant in the until reactivated in the following December. The new joey is born 25 days later, 12 months after the mating at which it was conceived. However, if her original joey

dies, the dormant embryo begins to develop from that point, and the new joey is born earlier.

The single young is suckled in the for eight to nine months. Females become mature at nine months of age, while they are still suckling and males mature at two years. Management issues

The species is abundant on Kangaroo Island because of the absence of foxes and because of the increase in grassy grazing areas as a result of agricultural development. There is sufficient dense remnant vegetation to provide the daytime shelter the wallaby requires.

In some areas of the island, the high density of these animals results in severe damage to newly emergent crops and pastures, as well as plantings of native trees. To alleviate this problem, landholders can obtain permits to destroy small numbers of wallabies on their properties.

The Tammar wallabies on Kangaroo Island now represent the largest remaining natural population of this species. Given the presence of feral on the island, they are not necessarily as secure in the long term as their present abundance suggests.

References

Strahan, R (ed) (1983). The Australian Museum Complete Book of Australian . Angus and Robertson, .

Inns, R.W. (1980). Ecology of the Kangaroo Island wallaby Macropus eugenii in Flinders Chase National Park, Kangaroo Island. Ph.D. Thesis, University of .

Wood Jones, F. (1925). The Mammals of South Australia. Government Printer, Adelaide.

For more information Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Centre 37 Dauncey Street, Kingscote P (08) 8553 4444 E [email protected] www.naturalresources.sa.gov.au/kangarooisland/