Any keeper will tell you that the highlight of their job is watching young animals growing up; and sometimes we are even lucky enough to lend a hand in this process…
“After a hard day’s work...the little ones are all fed and
snoozing by the fire...the hum of the washing machine can be heard and soon a
load of pouches and towels will be hung out to dry...with a glass of red in my
hand I contemplate a nap before our next feeding time”.
Raising young ‘ens can be hell, but for these little angles
it’s well worth it!
Following such a successful breeding season and bearing in
mind that captive bred devils could well be the saviour to prevent the
extinction of the Tasmanian devil, Devil Ark has decided to assist wean and hand
rear joeys of special genetic importance.
My two little devils were removed from their mother who had
four joeys, a very full pouch and a heavy burden! So we waited until these two
where approaching an age of independence and we started assist weaning them.
This happens around an age of 120 days - when joeys are in and out of the pouch
and often can be seen on the mother’s back.
Assist weaning is something we try and do with females with
four joeys. It gives mum some relief and helps her to recover faster. As you
can imagine, one joey can be hard enough to look after, let alone four clinging
to your back! In a few months these two will be returned to an enclosure with
their siblings so they can learn to be little devils.
When I first had my little charges they weighed around
200grams and have short thin coats and rounded features. The male has a white
stripe on his chest and is black all over. While the female has a broken white
stripe on her chest, and stripes across her shoulders and tail base and black
all over. These are the markings they will retain for the rest of their lives.
For the next few months they’ll spend their time in and out of my ‘pouch’ which
consists of a combination of beanies and knitted sacks and towels (made from
cotton or wool – nothing artificial).
They are currently being bottle feed using a special
marsupial milk replacer. This was initially every four hours round the clock.
Fortunately their tummies gradually grew and I could increase the feeding
volume and thankfully the time in between each feed expanded to every six hours.
They sure love their tucker! When I wrap them up and put
bottle to their mouth they greedily drink.
One month on and their fur has thickened and features have
sharpened, they really look just like mini devils now. Starting out at 200grams
they weigh almost 500grams now. They are growing well -putting on weight every
day. They are also quite mobile now, and before a feed love nothing more than a
good chase and rumble - all important behaviour that will be necessary in their
adult lives. Like all young though, they can’t help but to fall asleep once
with a full belly of milk.
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| regular weigh ins to ensure appropriate weight gains |
A bonus of this hand rearing is the opportunity for people
to ‘meet’ and interact with these beautiful animals. Often it changes people’s
attitudes when they come face to face with a ‘real’ Tasmanian devil. I have
heard many people say things like “they are so much softer than I expected”;
“oh they don’t smell after all”; “I thought they would be mean”. Having hand
reared animals allows everyone to appreciate them as much as we do. And every
convert counts!
Over the course of the next few months I look forward to
bringing you more stories about my hand rearing adventures. The joeys will start
be getting up to more mischief as they are introduced to solid foods. They
already have developed a habit of stealing socks and stashing them behind the
fridge!
Finally we do request your help please. We are seeking
special people to adopt one of our 32 joeys. The little female I’m raising was recently
adopted at the Gloucester Platypus festival and we are just waiting on her new
adoptees, six year old twins Evaena and Nathan, to name her.
Now we just need the rest of our joeys to find generous ‘adoptive’parents. If we act together we can save the devil.
See you at the next festival.
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