SteveNT
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Our place tonight
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pythonmum
Very Well-Known Member
Forget the fish, the bats are great! When my husband first met me, the flatmate and I were raising baby flying foxes. They are wonderfully social creatures, but we gave them back to the main wildlife carers to be introduced to the social colony when they started urine bathing. A necessity in the wild, but funny and stinky when done by an incompetent juvenile bat. This was in the lovely days before lyssavirus (bat rabies) hit Australia.
SteveNT
Very Well-Known Member
Do you think Lyssa arrived recently or has been here for many moons and we just noticed?
Some people think they're a lineage of primates and I can understand why. There's not much in common with micro bets except wings! And fur.
i love the birth process where mum catches the baby as it falls and tucks it into her armpit!
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pythonmum
Very Well-Known Member
I am not sure about Lyssa. Rabies has been in Indonesia for a long time and the flying foxes have no trouble with that flight, so has probably been here a lot longer than we realise. We can't call it rabies, or we lose our rabies-free status for quarantine (got this from a disease expert in Darwin).
I think the similarities with primates (based mainly on brain mapping) are mostly from their similar lifestyle - arboreal fruit eaters. The micro and macro bats are more similar to each other than to primates, but there was clearly an early split in their evolution. This is unlike seals and sea lions which show convergent evolution, even though they are both classified into the same group. It is hard to sort out the early mammalian radiations because they exploded so quickly after the demise of the big dinosaurs.
I think the similarities with primates (based mainly on brain mapping) are mostly from their similar lifestyle - arboreal fruit eaters. The micro and macro bats are more similar to each other than to primates, but there was clearly an early split in their evolution. This is unlike seals and sea lions which show convergent evolution, even though they are both classified into the same group. It is hard to sort out the early mammalian radiations because they exploded so quickly after the demise of the big dinosaurs.
SteveNT
Very Well-Known Member
Cheers, good info.
Either way I love fruit bats and on long hauls to Kalkaringi or Ngukurr I keep a towel handy for getting them off the barbed wire fences that surround a lot of dams. End of the day it's not the antiquity of Lyssa I'm afraid of.
They're very tasty after they've spent a couple of weeks raiding the mango plantations!
Either way I love fruit bats and on long hauls to Kalkaringi or Ngukurr I keep a towel handy for getting them off the barbed wire fences that surround a lot of dams. End of the day it's not the antiquity of Lyssa I'm afraid of.
They're very tasty after they've spent a couple of weeks raiding the mango plantations!
cactus2u
Well-Known Member
yip gotta love the sunsets up there Was there for 3mths after leaving NZ before heading over here Wish we stayed in Darwin in some ways
But will end back up there
But will end back up there
waruikazi
Legendary
One of the old fellas told us how to cook them in a ground oven. They say they are best during the build. You dig a small pit, light your fire, throw in pandanus nuts and rocks for heat. Once the flames are gone put the bat in belly side down and cover over with paper bark and then sand.
Dig it up after about an hour, throw the bat away and eat the rocks!
That's disgusting Steve! Lol!
Dig it up after about an hour, throw the bat away and eat the rocks!
That's disgusting Steve! Lol!
SteveNT
Very Well-Known Member
The original story featured galahs. Heard it in the 60's lol.
They are very nice cooked on whitegum coals until they are just so! . Not as embaressing as a splayed quail on a plate!
Those were the days. Long, long ago I did a wildlife carer's course with WIRES. The place where I did it had a colony of captive flying foxes - possibly under care or unable to be released, I can't remember. After lunch we went into the big cage where they were kept and were introduced to one or two of them. I'd had dates at lunchtime and didn't have time to wash my hands, which turned out to be a happy omission. I will never forget the experience of having a flying fox hanging off my arm and thoroughly licking my hand.
These days we wouldn't have been allowed in the cage.
Stunmug
New Member
Great pictures of the fruit bats Steve, I've seen them in Victoria also, they love our Loquat tree.
Pretty handy fish Darlyn !
Pretty handy fish Darlyn !
Jay84
Very Well-Known Member
Nice pics Steve. We have heaps of fruitbats at our house. They roost around the corner in yarra bend park, each nice they come and feed in our trees.
Sezzzzzzzzz
Very Well-Known Member
Beautiful pictures Steve! Its so lovely up in the NT. Wish I could convinve Hubby to go there with me, but the poor man doesnt stop sweating in the middle of a Sydney winter, cant imagine what the poor bugger would be like in a NT winter! LOL
SteveNT
Very Well-Known Member
Wrap him in glad wrap and give him a feeder tube! Long as he understands Darlyn will get the biggest fish.
We have excellent fluid replenishment processes and dont lose many Mexicans
And there are sights to see, adventures to have and fish to fang!
Give him a nudge!
We have excellent fluid replenishment processes and dont lose many Mexicans
And there are sights to see, adventures to have and fish to fang!
Give him a nudge!
I
imported_Varanus
Guest
Wrap him in glad wrap and give him a feeder tube! Long as he understands Darlyn will get the biggest fish.
We have excellent fluid replenishment processes and dont lose many Mexicans
And there are sights to see, adventures to have and fish to fang!
Give him a nudge!
You guys are making me feel terribly homesick this xmas
! All my "mob" keep calling me and asking when I'm coming up again and I'm unable to give a definitive answer,.Whatever you do, don't get stuck "down South" and caught up in commitment, with bland people who have even blander attitudes because it just leads to a bad, incurable case of "itchy feet". Life's too short!!
waruikazi
Legendary
Blander or Balander attitudes?
Territory joke folks hahaha.
Territory joke folks hahaha.
I
imported_Varanus
Guest
"Them's hangin words", Gordo....but spot on!
!
SteveNT
Very Well-Known Member
After my first 5 years up here with the attendant adventures I revisited my my home suburb. People told me of the couch they bought 2 years ago and the Commodore/ Falcon they bought 4 years before that.
???????????????????????????????????????????????
These were the highlights!
May the spuds stay where they are and folk with a sense of life unlike television continue to arrive.
and yes Gordo they are very similar words and concepts!
???????????????????????????????????????????????
These were the highlights!
May the spuds stay where they are and folk with a sense of life unlike television continue to arrive.
and yes Gordo they are very similar words and concepts!
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