Wilbur wombat
Things have been busy at Bohollow. This time of year Deb at our Kotupna shelter is always flat out with roo joeys while here at our Bunbartha shelter the daily patient numbers coming in slow down a little. During the winter months we are always busy with raptors, particularly owls but winter is always the time of year we work hard on the maintenance aspect of shelter work so everything is shipshape coming into the busy baby bird season of spring and sumner.
We do have a very new critter currently in care with us. Little Wilbur Wombat.
Wilbur came to us after being found in his deceased mother’s pouch and only weighed in at 350g. It’s always a nervous time when critters come to us so young, particularly when the entire experience of suddenly becoming an orphan can be severely stressful for the creature involved.
He settled in pretty quickly though which has been a relief and is already beginning to get his hair and is putting on weight nicely. On arrival, Wilbur was pink and naked...now he is still pink but has a beautifully soft five o’clock velvet shadow.
Wombats are a true commitment to take into your care as a wildlife carer. Out of all the different species we take into care at Bohollow, wombats have the longest time in our care from pink joeys to release stage. They take many months to develop and become independent from their mother and this is why wombats only have a joey once in every two or three years. Wilbur is a two and a half year commitment, or depending on the wombat, maybe even three.
Life at the moment revolves around wombat feeds around the clock every four hours, in between attending rescues and working on some flood recovery repairs on our flight enclosures. The shortage of sleep and the time put into little Wilbur’s care will be totally worth every second if we are able to help him grow to be the wild wombat he was set to become before his little life was turned upside down.
Thank you to all the people who attended the Nurture Nature event in Murchison last week! We had a great turn out and it was wonderful to see so many kids and adults alike genuinely interested in learning more about our unique native wildlife and getting involved in nature. We love working alongside our friends at RiverConnect and GM Landcare Network to allow people to connect and get closer to nature.
Awareness is the precursor to understanding and protecting the intricate web of life, of which we are all a part of.
