Northern Territory

Northern Territory Bilby Red Kangaroo Wedge-Tailed Eagle

Bilby • Bilbies are a marsupial and are the biggest of the Bandicoot family. • Bandicoots are small to medium sized marsupial omnivores this means they are small, have pouches and eat plants and animals for food just like people do. • The word bandicoot is an anglicised word that means turned into English and means pig-rat. • Before Australia was colonised in 1788 there were two types of Bilby Macrotis lagotis and Macrotis leucura. • Macrotis leucura became extinct in the 1950’s leaving only the one type left and the bilby we know is in danger of becoming extinct too.

Anatomy • The word bilby means long-nosed Nat and suits it’s characteristics. • Bilbies differ from Bandicoots mostly in appearance. Bilbies ears and tails are much bigger and if you got to hold one it’s fur is much softer to touch compared to the Bandicoot. • The name Bilby is from the Aboriginals in NSW but they are also known as Dalgite in West Australia and Pinkie in South Australia

Diet • Bilbies are nocturnal so they sleep during the day and are awake at night. • They eat many things and get all the water they need from their food so they do not need to drink water to survive. • The Bilby will dig or scratch around to find their food like insects, spiders, fruit, leaves, seeds, bulbs (which are large seeds for flowers like daffodils) and even fungi or other small animals. • Thy have a long tong to help find food just like an echidna does.

Species • There is only one type of Bilby left alive today and it is almost extinct. • Originally there were two the Greater Bilby (Macrotis lagotis) still alive today and Lesser Bilby (Macrotis leucura) now extinct. • Many Australians know about the Bilby because of Easter where awareness of the Bilby was set up to help save the endangered species and profits made from Bilby chocolates are used to fund protection and research for the Bilby. • The Bilby makes burrows in the ground like rabbits do to live so their pouches are upside down so that when they are digging holes dirt does not get in. • The Bilby does not make just one burrow to live in they make many in a small area close together and move from one to the other. • This helps to keep them safe from other animals that hunt them and the sun while they sleep during the day.

Red Kangaroo • The red Kangaroo is the Faunal Emblem of the Northern Territory which means it is the animal that represents the territory. • The Red Kangaroo is the biggest of the Kangaroos and is the largest marsupial still alive today. • A group of Red Kangaroos is called mob and they prefer the large open spaces of the Australian desert avoiding bush and forest areas. • Red Kangaroos got their name from the colour of their fur but can also be grey in colour.

Anatomy • The Red Kangaroo’s long tail helps to keep them balanced especially when jumping. • Their legs are very powerful and can they can jump as far as 9 meters into the air in one leap. • Like other marsupials the Red Kangaroo is nocturnal sleeping during the day usually found resting under a large tree to help keep cool. • Red Kangaroos are also crepuscular which is a word used to describe animals that are active at twilight the time before sunrise or after sunset.

Diet • The Red Kangaroo is a herbivore eating grass and other plants in the area. • As long as there are green plants they do not need fresh water to drink and can go long periods without a drink getting all they need from what they eat. • Red Kangaroos will need drinking water if what they are eating is not green like the brown grasses often seen in drought areas as these plants do not contain a lot of water in them the greener the plant the more water it has inside.

Species • There are four species of Kangaroo in Australia. • The Red Kangaroo (Macropus rufus) Antilopine Kangaroo (Macropus antilopinus) Eastern Grey Kangaroo (Macropus giganteus) and the Western Grey Kangaroo (Macropus fuliginosis). • The Red Kangaroo has a range of vision of around 300 degrees due to the position of its eyes where people only have 180 degrees. • This ability to see almost any where around them helps to keep them safe from predators (other animals that want to hunt and eat them for food). • They are also very good at fighting and looks a lot like they are boxing and the Red Kangaroo is often called the boxing kangaroo. When they fight they will try to push their opponents off balance with their arms or kick with their legs using their tails to keep balanced.

Wedge-Tailed Eagle • The Wedge-Tailed eagle (Aquila audax) can be found all over Australia but are more common in dry woody and open areas like our deserts. • The Wedge-Tailed Eagle can often be seen Northern Territory (NT) desert areas flying as high as 200 meters in the air. • There are a few things that make the Wedge-Tailed Eagle a special bird, firstly it is the largest of the eagle species and secondly the females are larger than the male which is not common in a lot of animals including humans. • If you were to measure the length of the Wedge-Tailed Eagles wings from tip to tip when spread out the length could be as long as 2.3 meters or 230 centimetres that’s longer than most peoples height. • The Wedge-Tailed Eagle is also the Bird emblem of the NT the bird chosen to represent the NT and often appears on coat of arms.

Anatomy • When Wedge-tailed Eagles get their first real feathers for flight they are light brown in colour and slowly get darker till they are a dark blackish brown colour all over. • the Wedge-Tailed Eagle gets its name from the wedge shape of its tail that other eagles do not have. • The adult Wedge-Tailed Eagle has blackish brown feathers and its beak is pink to cream in colour and has soft white coloured feet that look sort of cream in colour.

Diet • Wedge-Tailed Eagles eat live animals like rabbits, lizards, hairs other smaller birds and small animals. • They can also hunt together to catch larger animals like the kangaroo by singling them out from the group and forcing them to fall or get hurt making them easier to kill. • The Wedge-Tailed eagle also eat carrion this is common in many large hunting birds. • Carrion are dead animals. Often animals die of natural causes or are killed by another animal but not eaten and are left out in the open. • The job of scavengers like the Wedge-Tailed Eagle is to help clean up the country of these dead animals.

Species • When Wedge-Tailed Eagles meet and decide to produce offspring (babies) they stay together for the rest of their lives. • Wedge-Tailed Eagles lay eggs often two or three a season around July and each egg is laid one at a time a few days apart so they do not hatch at the same time. • The first to hatch is the biggest and each one gets smaller than the next. • Young are born white and get darker as they get older. • The Wedge-Tailed Eagle is a protected species and are not allowed to be hunted or killed. • Thy were once thought to be vermin that killed farm animals so many people would kill them and at one point in Queensland there was a bounty given for dead Wedge-Tails. • A bounty is a reward of money for the capture of someone or some thing often seen in western movies as “wanted dead or alive” for criminals. This has led to a great decline in their number in the past.

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Northern Territory