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niggles

Did you know wombats are awesome?

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yes i did and that is sure one beautiful baby you got there :)

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he is beautiful.

I have been learning lots of interesting things about wombats, if you have any questions please ask!

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They get very cheeky with age, my mother has raised a few..

Every single one has a different character.

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yeah this little guy is really sweet and cuddley. He gets very excited and leaps around like a jumping bean and likes to bite my fingers sometimes

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Naw. How old is he now niggles? What is he eating?

You obviously make a good foster parent. Well done niggles.

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Very cuddly indeed :)

Love the photos.

Edited by interbeing

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I'm not getting anything from the drop box link, is every one else seeing pics?

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I'm not getting anything from the drop box link, is every one else seeing pics?

Works for me amz

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Works for me amz

Hmm. What am I missing. I wanna see too.

Let me have another crack.

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Ok I got it. I had to open in app. Very cute indeed. Such a proud dad you are niggles.

Thanks for sharing :)

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hey amz he is about 8 ish months old, he eats grass and dirt and rolled oats and special pellets a little bit., for special treats he gets sweet potato and carrot.

he also has wombaroo - a special wombat formula in bottles as milk replacement. He cannot have cows milk it is very bad for wombats apparently and can cause much pain and sickness.

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thanks for shareing love the pics.

they are amazing. Self planting 2, dig there own hole and all :P

anyway much respect for what you doing

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Thanks for sharing niggles.

How would you go about becoming a foster parent. Is it through some org or did rescue it youself?

My wife would be perfect for this type of thing. She has a love and special connection with all animals

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Super cool, thanks for sharing.

Maybe thats what people mean when they say "ya wombat" awesome and magical.

Oi Niggles...ya wombat :P

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Hard to imagine that cute thing could write a car off in the future and walk away pretty much.

It is cute but.

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i want one :)

good onya both for caring for him

Edited by pimento

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yeah we are foster carers - me and my girlfriend share the responsibility - you need to be supervised by a licensed wildlife shelter - in victoria anyways. in NSW you have to do a course to get a qualification.

so there is paperwork involved in making it legit. it is not ok to keep them as pets, it has to be with a plan to release back into the wild.

There is a fair bit of care involved, he has pretty much needed someone with him at all times as he has grown up, feeds every 4 hours until he got bigger.

As I write this he is cuddling in my lap and chewing on my jumper zippers.

for the first 10 months or so he would rarely be out of contact or sight of mum so he relies on having someone there to feel secure.

it is a great thing to do, but it takes a lot of time and attention. I wouldn't have been able to do it by myself and it was really important to have the supervision and advice of more experienced carers to make sure he always had the best care.

to become a licensed wildlife shelter/carer you have to be a foster carer for at least 12 months (in victoria)

to be a foster carer you have to meet a shelter person and get them agree to take you on. I was lucky it just kind of fell into my lap.

We found an injured cockatoo on the road one day and ended up taking it to this shelter - which was a lovely couple who have turned their lives and property into a wildlife shelter and do it all out of their own pocket.. so my girlfriend and I made a raffle and raised them some money to show how much we appreciate their awesomeness and we became friends.

You can find shelters through the care for wildlife group

www.careforwildlife.org

https://www.wildlifevictoria.org.au/

www.helpforwildlife.org.au/help_for_wildlife.html

If you would like to support wombats everywhere and find out more - join the wombat protection society!

http://www.wombatprotection.org.au/ its only $20

I think calling someone a wombat is a compliment of the highest order! :)

Edited by niggles
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Also! I now check roadkill wherever I go.

The poor little babies can live up to five days in the pouch of a dead mum.

It doesnt take much effort I just leave some gloves, a pair of scissors, a snuggly blanket, some fluro spray paint and a folded up box in the car.

When I see roadkill I pull over somewhere safe and go back check the pouch. On a wombat the pouch faces backwards. Its meant to be pretty obvious if there is a baby in there, but you can use scissors to cut the pouch open to check better or get them out. If the roadkill has elongated nipples (more than an inch long) then there was a baby.. it may have fallen out somewhere nearby.

if you find a baby wrap it up warm and keep it near your chest - heartbeat keeps them calm and your body heat will keep them warm, then get help!

In vic - if you see an injured animal or find a baby you can call 0417380687 to get someone to come sort it out for you.

When you check for a pouch you should clear the animal away from the road so eagles and other scavengers dont get killed eating it - and I paint a fluro cross on the animal after checking so noone else has to bother.

--edit--

babies can be quite strongly attatched to the nipple, its scometimes better to cut the nipple off than to trry and pull the baby off the nipple. the carers can figure that out later.

you can read more about pouch checking and animal first aid on the sites listed above.

Edited by niggles
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Thanks for the links and info niggles.

Our house is starting to look like a zoo now with all the pets we have around here.

So the plus side with fostering would be that once the injued animal has healed, she could return them to there home. Although i know there would be water works every time

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also wombats shouldnt have any contact with cats or dogs or their smells as it may effect their survival once released.

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niggles, give us more practical tips so we may aspire to your greatness. i love the concise information you've given although many of us will never encounter a wombat.

i'll start.

-one or two strands of regular wire at the top of a barbwire fence will be enough to save most of the animals that would have otherwise died (sugar gliders, flying foxes, etc)

-keep various wildlife rescue numbers in your mobile phone

- in the case of bats, even though their danger to humans is overstated, you should never try to handle them. if you were to catch something the media would do far more damage to bats than any good that might have come from your attempted rescue. little ones can survive in a dead mother for days so if you see a fresh-looking corpse call the experts.

- in my experience, vets will deal with injured birds if you bring them in. the basic technique is to put them in a towel.

Edited by ThunderIdeal
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also wombats shouldnt have any contact with cats or dogs or their smells as it may effect their survival once released.

We have a cat so that rules out that idea.

You and your partner are good people niggles. It does take a special person to do what your doing

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HAh! thanks so much for the compliments folks, but I think we are very lucky people more than anything. Getting to have little nigel (the wombat) around is an honor and a privilege. He has deeply enriched our lives. There is a lot of work involved in looking after him but I have enjoyed all of it.

I have bonded with him more than i can imagine bonding with my own child. I love him very much, but not in a way that I want to keep him. I just want him to be able to go and live his wombat life out in the bush somewhere perfect and make lots of little nigels.

So it looks like a little girl wombat will be joining him in the next few weeks to become his buddy so he will have a familiar playmate to hang out with when its time for him to move to the country. Very exciting.

Im excited to watch them interact.

Typically in the wild they would not have playmates other than mum, but apparently in fostering they get on quite well with other baby wombats and it helps them learn wombatty behaviour better.

What else can I tell you about wombats? Well they are supposed to be very individual, with different tastes and attitudes.

JAckie French the Australian author has spent several decades around wombats, she says their personalities are awesome. She knew a wombat that would collect fresh lavender each day to sleep on. Sounds awfully cute.

Did you like the photos?

I can probably dig up some more...

Ill put up a really cute video of him being playful. Wombats being playful is the silliest cutest thing ever.

the vid will be in the dropbox link in the first post.

--edit--

in the last video i just posted, little nigel is following someone around you can see how he relies on contact as wombat eyesight isn't so good. so he chases her heels around to make sure he doesn't get lost... towards the end of the video he gets confused and starts chasing the kangaroo which gets scared and runs away.. a bit funny but he did get scared - and he makes a little scared sound, usually wombats are quite quiet - or this one is. thats the first sound we'd heard him make other than sneezes and hiccups and coughs. (he gets the hiccups when he's excited)

Edited by niggles

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Of course we liked the photos?! Lol.

So what time of the year are babies most likely to be in pouches? Spring I imagine?!

We get a lot of Roos on the road to work. There are road signs and led signs but they roos still get collected. It's an average of 2 a week dead on the side of the road. It's just along one particular stretch of road too. We need a tunnel for the cars. :) . When I first heard someone at work talking about 'spray painting' the dead body of a roo / wombat etc.., I was about to fire up, and then they explained why it's done. Lol

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