Cleland Conservation Park

I've always wanted to visit the Cleland Conservation Park on Mount Lofty. I am, after all, a sucker for nature and wildlife. I believe things never got off the ground last year as everyone was waiting for everyone else. Earlier this year LH went with XN; they were nice enough to invite me along but I've had had enough of being a tiang lampu for 10 years by then so I declined. Finally sometime last week I heard Thinesh was entertaining thoughts of going there so I jumped at the possibility and attempted to make plans.

Lucky us as it was a fairly nice Autumn day and we took off. The forecast was a sunny 22-ish day. We arrived in due time, paid, bought a couple of foodpacks to feed the kangaroos, emus and waterfowl, and entered the park. As we were heading for the "You Are Here" map we saw a few of these creatures:

Potoroos @ Kangaroo Rats. Could be mistaken for the vermin back home but these are much cuter. They have the same beady eyes though.
We spotted them scurrying about everywhere in the park. However, outside the park they are apparently next to extinct.



We next went into the Kangaroo area. They seemed smaller than I had imagined them to be though. Furthermore the particular species in that area had heads that resembled those of donkeys. Most of the mobs were just lazing around on the ground. Interestingly the lazing position they assumed was incredibly similar to those of my pets back home. Heck, I think I may have been in that position as well when lazing around at home.
A few of the braver ones (almost all of them were fairly tame) came hopping as soon as they saw us/heard the food packs we were holding. Feeding wildlife has never been easier. Some were really insistent, attempting to keep a paw on the hand holding the pack, probably in an attempt to keep us from withdrawing the food. We saw a couple of albinos, a joey suckling, and more joeys in their mother's pouches. That looked really weird since the mom had an extra pair of legs sticking out of its abdomen.

Soon after, the Koala 'exhibit' was opened so we left for that.

It was basically a large enclosure with a huge central 'hut' and a few large Eucalyptus trees for them. We noticed a few that kept 'running' around the enclosure. We chalked it up to their version of exercise :)








The 'Pet the Koala' session. According to the keeper, that was a 10 year old male (Koala live an average of 15 years). One may pet them by stroking the soft fur on their backs as anywhere else will aggravate them apparently.

Koalas eat only Eucalyptus and have evolved such that the normally toxic leaves do not affect them. They have 2 thumbs. Their hearing is about 10 times greater than ours. In fact, there were quite a few times when it stopped eating when we were waiting in line. Apparently that happens when a 'loud' noise surprises them...and there was a baby in line ahead of us.


We next went to see the Dingos. Apparently they are pests in the wild and it is a crime to keep one as a pet. They happen to be the reason why the local carnivores such as the Tasmanian Devil are now only found in certain locations. They also happen to be the reason for the Longest Fence which practically spans across the country.

Next on the map was the Wetlands, where we saw a tonnes of avians.

<-- Can anyone guess why I took this picture?





A snakebird. No, seriously, that's what it's called. It looks really disproportionate because of the long neck. This particular one assumed that position for at least 30 minutes. No, I have no idea why. The ranger said that in the water, its body is submerged and only the head remains above water, hence the name.


When we tried to feed a few we attracted the attention of most of the birds. One really 'aggressive' duck came and pecked away at the pellets in our hands like a machine-gun. For some reason, it decided the tip of my index finger was food a pecked at it and tried to pull it off. As a result, my index finger is now 1cm shorter.

No, I'm kidding :) It was painful though.
Other birds there were swans, pelicans, different species of ducks, geese, stilts and ibises.

There were a couple of aviaries that we visited as well. There was also an enclosure for a Mallee (go Wiki it for more details) where there were a couple of huge Mallee ducks among other birds.

We next went in search for the famed emus that scared the living daylights out of XN. They weren't the only ones there though. More roos aplenty, although these were much cuter than the first group. Managed to get Thinesh to grab a pic of this one's head in my foodpack :)

Overall the roos were really tame. I could even pet them and they wouldn't bat an eyelid (but that's probably cuz they were more interested in the food I was holding).



Finally. The huge-@$$, flightless bird of Australia. Looks like someone just dumped a dishevelled shag carpet on it. About half of them were quite wary of us. The other half approached because we had food.
Feeding them was interesting. Their beaks aren't sharp and when they feed it feels like bucket scoops. Apparently they can grow up to 2 metres tall but all of them were, at most, slightly taller than me. Not sure why XN was scared of them though.



One of the areas we visited was reminiscent of a rock quarry which was the habitat of the rock wallabies. They were so well camouflaged that we had difficulty even locating them.

Another species of wallaby, the Tamaar Wallaby. This is possibly one of the cutest things I've ever seen!

I still can't really tell the difference between a roo and a wallaby yet. The rock wallabies looked quite like the roos.






Caught a pic of one eating an apple...I think...









One of the last creatures we saw was Knuckles. Eat your heart our Sonic!!

Echidnas, like Platypuses, are weird mammals. They lays eggs, then suckle their young. Isn't it cute?



We also saw 2 wombat couples dozing in their caves. They are the closest relative of the koalas but they are ground creatures. A large adult can reach 40kgs. That's like, heavier than Jebbrine.

The only other animal worth mentioning is the Tasmanian Devil. It had an enclosure all to itself, and was basically just running around the entire place the whole time we were there. Either it was really bored or decided to lose some weight.

I'd say it was a day well spent since I've been deprived of animal contact for months now. I'm happy.