always look up when you are in bush as you never know what you will find :) I'm pretty much directly underneath Maxine as she did crack her eyelid a tiny bit to peek at me before going back to peaceful sleep. Feels nice to have a whole new year stretching ahead!
IMHO this shot conveys the trust and security that Maxine (and the others) enjoy, provided by you at Koala Gardens. Long may you continue this fascinating and life consuming work...and may we all recognise your care and devotion to these wonderful animals and the glimpse they give us of their lives in the wild. Thank you! Take a Big Bow and may 2019 bring you much pleasure, satisfaction and joy.
@Weezilou@jacqbb what a great question - the simple answer is by nose pattern. Each of them have a different pattern of pigmentation (or the patches of no pigmentation) on their noses. Some are really distinctive, and some are less, but I always get a clear face shot of a new koala and keep a file of nose patterns that I can then refer to at need.
They do also have the mottled markings on their hindquarters but they are hard to tell apart as the way they sit can totally skew the pattern.
On my website page about the colony you can see differences in each nose. If a koala comes here that I don't recognise I can spend a lot of time carefully comparing to every different nose on record - so far I have identified 65 different koalas here so it can be quite a task!
@samae@s4sayer@beryl@fbailey@sugarmuser@hermann@ziggy77@tonygig thank you - of course she was a long distance from me high up a mature bloodwood so that combined with recognising the gnat that comes buzzing along on the quad bike each day means no alarm for her. (probably around 20 m above me)
If however, she were low down in the tree and I approached, she would immediately go leaping up the tree and then again look calm :)
They do also have the mottled markings on their hindquarters but they are hard to tell apart as the way they sit can totally skew the pattern.
On my website page about the colony you can see differences in each nose. If a koala comes here that I don't recognise I can spend a lot of time carefully comparing to every different nose on record - so far I have identified 65 different koalas here so it can be quite a task!
If however, she were low down in the tree and I approached, she would immediately go leaping up the tree and then again look calm :)