Talks to animals: My life among the chickens: New Aussie furry friends

Sydney is full of animal parks, and I intend on visiting them all. First on the list was Koala Park Sanctuary. This is a very nice small sanctuary that has a nice array of Australian wildlife, least of all the well loved koalas. We were lucky enough to be visiting when one of the females still had a small joey. He would not turn his face towards the visitors, but hung on to mama and slept. Later on, I observed him practicing climbing. Of course, I had to pet one and his fur was rougher than I expected, not soft like a lemur or cat, but thicker and rougher (with some softness). Normally, koalas are grumpy creatures, but these animals had been raised from joeys around hums and are amazingly tolerant.

The park also has grey kangaroos, (small) in a rest area where you can pet and feed them. We were the first to arrive for that “feeding shift”, and were rewarded with the sole attention of two females that greedily wolfed down our offering of what appeared to be cheerios. The larger female then preceded to grab the remaining back out of my hand and examine it for more food. What ensued was a short game of snatch back that luckily, did not result in me getting boxed. It is my understanding that you do not want to aggravate a kangaroo, especially a large red, for they can gut you open like a fish with those long claws. Do not be fooled, those short little T-rex arms are more useful than you think.

Although we did not go to the sheep shearing demonstration, we were able to observe the dogs rounding up and moving the sheep and the odd emus. Talk about an odd flock, the emus towered over the sheep and although they moved as they pleases they did tend to keep with the flock.

If you like the dinosaur birds, then you will like the cassowary, a beautiful bird that truly looks like a descendant of a dinosaur with strong beak, sharp eyes, bony looking head crest, colourful skin, and strong thick legs. I was glad that there was a fence between him and us, not that it would have stopped him if he really got pissed off at me.

On the cute side of birds, were the world’s smallest penguins, the Fairy penguins. The little cuties enjoyed the fish served up by a friendly chap who made fun of me and my two jackets. He also took joy in searching my head for blond hairs that I should have had because I had left Hawaii to come live in Australia. It is all good because I made comments about his male penguin being a cradle robber at 25 years old and taking a 10 year old for a bride.

We also enjoyed seeing the back of a sleeping echidna, a pacing wombat, lounging dingos, sleeping possums and fruit bats, playful cockatoos, budgies, galahs, and Kookaburras that laughed only when you were not looking.