Bye-bye Burraneer Henry *sniff*

He's completely trashed the place. There's a large patch of bark he's chewed or scratched off his gunyah; the newspaper on the floor is trampled, and he's kicked over his dirt and water which has intermingled with the bits of chewed off leaf and poop scattered over the floor. It looks like the koala version of a rockstar's hotel room. Did Jim Morrison come back as Morrish Steven?

Cathie Sampson
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Judy is teamleader today and I'm allocated the smaller yards near the ICU block. Lately I'm always doing yard 10, 9 or the aviaries, so I tend to skim past these smaller yards without stopping to smell the roses...er, koalas. It's good to be able to look in on Oxley Westi in yard 1 and Cathie Sampson in yard 3.

I remember the day that Sampson was brought in; he was suffering from acute diarrhoea. It was a Sunday and we had to put him a vacant aviary as there was a full house in ICU. I understand that his current prognosis is poor. You can tell he's an old koala just by looking at him. His face is slightly gaunt in the cheeks, like O'Briens Fiona; but mostly his age shows on his nose, the most prominent part of a koala's face. Sampson's nose shows he's been in the wars; it's scratched like he's foraged around in more than a few bushes in his time, and maybe even had some scraps with other male koalas.

Oxley Westi
From koalawrangler's gallery.

He's quietly sheltered by his leaf pot at one end, so I clear the leaf at the other. Sampson starts moving up the gunyah, tightrope-like, towards me. He stops still and regards me solemnly for a moment. It's then that I notice a tear welling in his right eye. It's a not a tear, really; his eye's just watering for some other physiological reason. Any other interpretation would be anthropomorphism, as Cheyne calls it.

Oxley Westi is is sleeping as I clean around her. It takes me ages to finish sweeping up her copious poop. As I stand up, I notice Peter coming out of the aviaries with a koala in his grasp. It's a small one so I don't recognise him straight away. "Who's that?" "Burraneer Henry" "That's little Henry?!"

Burraneer Henry
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Peter pauses on his path to the treatment room to give me a better look. It's Henry all right. That same angelic little face that none of us could resist photographing incessantly when he first came in back in January. He'd been brought in suffering a tick infestation and was in need of some serious R&R. Henry soon became a minor celebrity, holding court in yard 1A, enjoying the oohs and ahhs of visitors and vollies alike. He even had his picture in the local paper.

He's spend the last several weeks wedged high in the fork of a tree. After being there for all of us to gawp at lovinlgy for so long, these days all we've been treated to has been a glimpse of his furry posterior. Indeed, the only other evidence of his existence is the nibbles to his leaf each morning after his nocturnal munchies. That, and the new littering of poo pellets around his neatly raked yard. Henry's become like the Easter Bunny I remember from my childhood: leaving half-chewed carrots and a trail of easter eggs the morning after, with no sign of the animal in question.

There was a note up on the whiteboard for a while alerting the vollies that if/when Henry made an appearance on his gunyah, he should be captured in preparation for release. This must have occurred yesterday. I follow Henry into ICU like a lovelorn pup. Peter places Henry on the treatment room table to the delight of the onlookers at the viewing window. Cheyne prepares a basket for Henry's transport to his new home. Joeys typically don't have a home range; often joeys that come to the hospital are raised in home care. They usually release joeys in pairs to give them some company, like Links VTR and Ocean Kim.

In Henry's case, he's being released at the wilderness end of Burraneer Avenue where he was found. Barb also looked after Henry at home. Today she expresses her fears for him being a young male own their on his own. As well as the threats of urbanisation, motor vehicle accidents, and dog attacks, male koalas also each other to worry about.

With the outside yards complete, everyone chips in to clean the intensive care units. Judy's doing Jupiter Cheryl, Helen's in with Calwalla Bill, and I start on Morrish Steven's unit. He's completely trashed the place. There's a large patch of bark he's chewed or scratched off his gunyah; the newspaper on the floor is trampled, and he's kicked over his dirt and water which has intermingled with the bits of chewed off leaf and poop all over the floor. It looks like the koala version of a rockstar's hotel room. Did Jim Morrison come back as Morrish Steven?

Steven starts emitting that otherworldly mating noise the males make. His head is raised like he's howling at the moon. He's a feisty one, and a bit grabby. He reaches out towards me in a pushy manner. He's probably after fresh leaf. The koalas are often frisky until they get their morning leaf. Normally I suppose they'd be looking around for new leaf themselves; as patients, they have to wait till the hospital leaf trolley arrives. At least, it's better than human hospital food.

Across the way, Helen is cleaning Calwalla Bill's unit. He's moved off the upper beam of his gunyah onto the cross-beams below it. Helen is just bending to mop the floor, chatting as we all do to our respective koalas, when Bill unexpectedly swipes at her twice with his paw. It all seems to happen in slow motion. Helen pulls back. Luckily, she's only received a few scratches on her face. It wasn't aggression on Bill's part, merely his way of telling someone they're in his personal space. The trouble is he's armed with Edward Scissorhand-type claws. I remember Jules the tour guide telling us that koalas only actively use their claws for gripping trees; if actually were an offensive animal, imagine the damage they could do. Dogs would think twice before attacking them.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

National Koalagraphic

We're getting a bit of blue gum lately. I call it Skippy leaf -- according to my dusty mind records, it's exactly the kind of leaf that Sonny Hammond used to blow against to summon Skippy the bush kangaroo to the (usually improbable) rescue in the eponymously titled TV show.

Links Lorna
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I get in at 7am again today, Thursday. I'm continuing my teamleader training with Amanda. The concreters are at work pouring slabs around the edge of yards 1a, 2, 3, 4, 5 and part of yard 9. Just in time for the koala hospital open day on Saturday 7 April 2007.

Amanda has already checked that all koalas are present and accounted for inside in ICU. Like last time, she draws up a matrix with the acronym for each leaf type in columns across the top and the name of each outside koala down the side. Teamleaders only read leaf for those koalas directly in the care of the hospital, not the ones being monitored by the uni researchers. We then head out to the yards and attempt to determine which leaf is flavour of the month and which isn't.

The different types of leaf flummoxed me when I first began at the hospital. Several weeks of cutting and stripping branches on every shift has produced a gradual familiarity. Now I'm astounded by my growing ability to recognise different eucalypt types. I can pretty much tell apart Tallowwood, Nicholii, Melaleuca, Swamp Mahogany and Blue Gum. Swamp Mahogany is always a koala favourite -- for the koalas around here anyway; a koala from a different part of Australia would probably eat a different array of leaf, depending upon what is available in their home area.

We're getting a bit of blue gum lately. I call it Skippy leaf -- according to my dusty mind records, it's exactly the kind of leaf that Sonny Hammond used to blow against to summon Skippy the bush kangaroo to the (usually improbable) rescue in the eponymously titled TV show. Skippy was the after-school staple from my childhood. (You can see the scintillating opening credits to this iconic piece of kitsch 1960s Australiana here.)

I should qualify that I can generally pick the different leaf as long as each is in a nice single branch, but not necessarily when they're cut up and bunched together in the pot. It's a bit like being able to recognise whole heads of lettuce -- cos, iceberg, mignonette, romano....and then having to 'read' said leaves from within a mesclun salad. And 'reading' the leaf is what we have to do.

When we head into yard 10, there is koala on Tractive Golfer's gunyah and it's not Tractive Golfer! Yard 10 is a large open yard with a small circular yard within it that houses Ocean Therese. There are also about six smaller yards that run along the periphery of yard 10; these yards contain some of the koalas being monitored by Sydney uni researchers.

Tractive Golfer, one of the hospital's long-term residents, has free run in the main area of yard 10. He has scoliosis, producing a distinctively misshapen spine, whereas this unfamiliar koala is small, has normal spine curvature, and female -- judging by the tag in her right ear. Wait a minute! It's that tricksy O'Briens Fiona a.k.a. FiFi Houdini! Before I start wondering by what rare feats of magic she got from yard 9 (her most recent stomping ground) to yard 10, Amanda explains that, according to the whiteboard, Fiona's just been moved into the circular enclosure in yard 10 with Ocean Therese. She's obviously managed to scale her enclosure to make it into the main part of yard 10 (so still safely captive within the hospital). There she is sitting there happily chomping on Golfer's leaf.

There's a fine line to be trod between confining the koalas securely, but still enabling them the open-air environment they covet as wild animals. Most of the time, this balance works beautifully: the koalas enjoy both a secure outside existence in the yards while they still receive the best possible treatment and care. In Fiona's case, she seems to be a born roamer, and like her famous namesake Harry Houdini, is an expert at escapology.


Amanda & O'Briens Fiona
From koalawrangler's gallery.
By now Fiona has made her way to the ground and is coming towards us, ever after that elusive formula. Amanda mutters that she wishes she had a towel so that she could pick her up and redeposit her in her correct yard. "How 'bout my smock?". I whip off my koalawrangler smock and it works a treat. All koalas present and accounted for in their correct yards.

With the leaf checks done, I scatter the collection boxes around the yards. The morning troupe is trickling in. Vanessa and I are doing yard 10 together today. There's a couple of photographers here from National Geographic who are snapping away as we work. They're especially interested in the feeds. I go in to feed Sandfly Jye and wonder how my hair looks (like is there a huge green insect in it like the other day?). I'm mostly carrying on with my work as usual, except that I feel a little self-conscious cracking off superfluous stems at the leaf-rack with a photographer clicking away right in front of me. Now I know how the koalas feel when I'm on shift. Should I "vogue" or something?

Oxley Jo
From koalawrangler's gallery.

When I carry the wet leaf into Oxley Jo's yard, the photographer's compadre interrupts and asks if I can enter at less than a breakneck speed. And can I walk around the gunyah the long way. Okay, shurrrrr. I wonder what captions will appear under these photos. They dutifully copy down our names and the names of the koalas. I wonder if I'll be listed as "Oxley Jo" or "Links Lorna" by mistake.

Cheyne is giving "how to feed" refresher training to all the shifts this week. The first koala I ever fed was Kempsey Carolina. Her feeding style is pretty unique and I had to make it up with every new koala since, so it's good to understand the right way to do it. Cheyne has Anna Bay Miles to demonstrate on. The two most important things appear to be how much of the syringe you place in the koala's mouth and how fast you squirt. Only the skinny tip of the syringe should enter the koala's mouth, even though they may try to draw the wide part of the syringe in. Sometimes they chew on the end too; this makes sense since chewing is the natural way for them to eat, not slurping on a plastic tube. However, letting the koala chew on the syringe increases the likelihood that they'll bite a bit off -- not good. Although they will often try to pull the syringe to the front, it's place to slot the syringe tip along the edge of the koala's mouth between the front and back teeth. Their left-hand side is usually best since most people are right-handed and therefore feed from that side.

The other important aspect of feeding is not to force the formula out too quickly. No-one wants liquid syphoned into their mouths like a firehose -- including koalas. Drinking the formulat should be a pleasurable experience -- they should be allowed to enjoy it!

When I return to yard 10, I glance over to yard 9 and notice that both joeys in 9a are bunched up very high in their tree. Wow! Linksy is really climbing now, like a real koala. I'm happy-sad about it; glad for him that he's koalarising along with dehumanising, but sad that it spells his imminent release. I don't think he weigh enough yet though, so we'll have him for a while longer.

Before I go, Tricia points out Oxley Westi in a lounge pose. They usually let their limbs hang or stretch them out when they're trying to cool down.


Oxley Westi
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Wet koalas, wet koalawranglers

I'm talking to one visitor about koalas with wet-bottom, but she suddently breaks off the conversation to report, "SorrySorry, at first I thought it was a leaf but, actually, you have a praying mantis on your head".

Lookout Harry
From koalawrangler's gallery.

It poured rain all night, accompanied by a wild wind that disconcerted the cat. She cried out several times during the night and demanded comforting. During these wakeful moments I wondered whether the koalas were okay during the blustery night.

I woke early and got to the hospital at 7.45. Strangely, Peter, the Sunday team leader wasn't there yet. I walked around the grounds and all koalas seemed well, albeit a little damp. Sandfly Jye and Birthday Girl were the only two koalas who were completely awake. Still no sign of Peter which was really peculiar. Jo, another volunteer, arrived and she gave Pete a buzz on his mobile. "Oh", I heard her say. "Daylight saving's ended". That's right, the clocks went back during the early hours of this morning. It wasn't now 8am, it was 7am! D'oh.

Shamefaced, I ask Peter if there's anything useful I can do to fill in the next hour, like rinse the feedpots of their anti-bac. He says, sure, and I can make up today's feed as well. I feel well practised after closely watching Amanda mixing up the feed, and then preparing it myself last Thursday. It's complicated though -- different dosages, different types of formula, some are administered by vollies, some by vets. So I talk to myself throughout the process, wetting face-washers to go under each filled pot. There's a black lump in the sink which, when I tweeze it out with my fingers, I recognise as being a tick. It might have fallen off one of yesterday's vollies.

Sandfly Jye
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Emma and I are assigned to yard 10. It's started raining again and I'm relieved to have my plastic poncho. Emma starts to feed Ocean Therese and I head in to feed Sandfly Jye. He's perched on his gunyah among the leaf fronds and accepts the first syringe of formula. He jerks his arm towards me, not in a swipe, but probably to grip onto me as he would while eating leaf. It becomes awkward to feed him this way as my arms are bare, so I give up until a little later when he's more in the mood to feed.

By now, Emma is feeding Tractive Golfer who is sitting on the edge of his gunyah where he's getting rained on. She's got no wet-weather gear and is getting wetter by the minute. I start to rake out Ocean Therese's yard -- she's also drenched but outside her the shelter of her leaf, hugging a tree. A rainjacket-clad Andrea comes through to do her rounds. I try to feed Jye some more. He's moved up to the highest fork of the gunyah, shirking the shelter of the overhanging branches of leaf. This time, he drinks more readily and lets me finish the pot.

Sandfly Jye
From brokenpuzzle's gallery.

As I set out to sweep his yard, he jumps down to the lower beam and leans towards me. He's a funny one in terms of instigating human contact, chasing me around his gunyah the other day. I don't know if it's possible for him to jump on me...well, I know it's quite possible, I just don't know if he'd do it. I give him a wide berth and he scales down to the ground. At first he runs towards me, so I squat down to his level while I scrub out one of this leaf pots. I'm able to stand up and go about my cleaning and he generally leaves me alone; occasionally I feel a claw on my sock, but that's about it. He's bounding around his yard, scampering through puddles, not noticing the rain.


Sandfly Jye
From brokenpuzzle's gallery.
Lookout Harry and Warrego Martin are next. I swing Harry's umbrella around to shield him better from the rain. I empty one of his pots, revealing a cache of koala pellets in the fork of the beams once the leaf has shifted. Harry's face is encircled by leaf. Martin is cozy under his umbrella -- the only koala in the yard who's managed to stay completely dry. As I rake around his yard, he decides I've encroached his personal space and heads north...up to the spokes of his umbrella.

Warrego Martin
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Emma has looked after the koalas at the other end of yard 10: Links Lorna and Ocean Roy. We're now both drenched, despite our rain ponchos. We head inside for a cuppa and to dry off. Jim ducks his head into the day-room to ask if there's a trick to moving a koala off his towel. Jim's in ICU, warm and dry. I tease him that there are benefits to arriving late. He's replaced one of the towels on Anna Bay Miles's gunyah, but the koala is facing away from the direction Jim wants him to go and refusing to budge. I recall that Miles likes Melaleuca blosssoms so I head out to the leaf shed and try to hunt some out. I return with a branch. Miles nibbles the blossom enthusiastically, but won't be lured away. I suggest to Jim that he just leaves him; it's more distressing to force a koala to move that doesn't want to. He'll move when he's ready.

Danae is finished in the yards too, so she, Emma and I pitch in to help finish the units in ICU before the fresh leaf arrives. Emma takes Jupiter Cheryl, Danae takes Morrish Steven, and I take Calwalla Bill. His unit is wonderfully dry and quite clean. He hasn't kicked over his dirt or water, like many of the ICU koalas do; but, after I sweep away his paper and poop, he continues to drop pellets like airborne missiles, the same as on Friday.

Ocean Therese
From koalawrangler's gallery.

The leaf arrives and we re-don our ponchos and head back to the swamp of yard 10. We're realy drenched now, despite the wet-weather gear. Ocean Therese is still wrapped around her tree out in the rain, even though I replenish her leaf. Her fur looks soggy; I can squeeze it between my fingers and watch the rivulets run off. I could probably wring her out. She seems unpeturbed.

We do our best to give the koalas tall branches that droop to provide plenty of shelter. I struggle to stock Sandfly Jye's highest pot as I get asked a few questions by the tourists. I'm talking to one visitor about koalas with wet-bottom, but she suddently breaks off the conversation to report, "Sorry, at first I thought it was a leaf but, actually, you have a praying mantis on your head". I calmly call to Emma to get it off me. She doesn't want to touch it and flicks it off with a bunch of leaf.

The praying mantis that was in my hair!
From brokenpuzzle's gallery.

here and Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

By any other name would smell as sweet

Koala poo earrings
From Roo Poo Co.

Koala droppings are the chief constant in the life of a koalawrangler. Much of our 'wrangling' time is spent diligently sweeping or raking away each day's supply of poop. They collect in the forks of gunyahs where the koala has been sitting, like a little stash of eggs the koala's been nesting on. They gather in the corners of units and aviaries, only to skitter out across freshly cleaned floors with the flick of a broom. They float swollenly in water bowls (I once mistook one for a tick). Koalas drop them on you as you mop the floor beneath them like small missiles. Researchers even collect them for analysis from time to time.

The vollies have affectionate names for them: nuggets, bush chocolate, coffee beans, jelly beans, easter eggs. Another day, another pile of koala poo.

You don't realise how much there is to be thankful for that koalas have the pleasantest-smelling, least offensive poo I've ever encounter in an animal...until one gets diarrhoea. A recent admission, Walcha Barbie, has the affliction. She was caught in barbed wire and has to have her dressings changed every day. She has the most delightful disposition; sitting calmly as her arm is dressed, looking comfortable and at ease in her towel-packed basket.

The reason Barbie catches my eye as I pass the treatment room is that today she is wrapped in a rather fetching vividly striped towel, a bit like a fringed sash. It looks like she's wearing a Mexican serape, making her resemble a tiny Mariachi performer.

Barb gently cradles her upper paws and head on the treatment room table, while Cheyne sets about the unenviable task of cleaning up Barbie's sloppy fecal matter. This involves wiping around the fur at her bottom and also between the 'toes' of her back paws, which she alternately splays and relaxes as Cheyne cleans. I'm reminded of the time a tourist -- watching one of the volunteers refresh the leaf with a hose -- asked how often we bathe the koalas. (The answer is almost never). Barbie doesn't look at all uncomfortable during her sponging, and even tilts her face upwards to sniff at Barb in way that looks (but isn't) affectionate.

Standing away from the action at the treatment room door, I ask Cheyne if it smells? She assures me it does. It's funny how desensitised I've become to koala droppings actually being faeces and not just some inoffensive koala byproduct whose uniformly shaped pellets make them look almost mechanically produced. Each pellet consists of the densely packed eucalytptus leaf that the koala spends much of their waking hours diligently chewing. Their smell is barely distinguishable from the general eucalyptus haze that prevails in ICU.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Furry buddha

As I enter, Condon Geoff is seated behind a veil of uneaten Swamp Mahogany and naked leaf fronds looking like a koala version of Buddha. He stares at me beatifically from his verdant mount as I start to rake up his soggy newspaper and the random smattering of poo, like so many spent shell casings.

Oceanview Terry
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I'm doing a Monday shift for the first time; they thought they'd be down on numbers so they called me in. Koalawrangler to the rescue (not). I'm paired with Jarrod to do yards 4, 5, and 6: Burraneer Henry (who I haven't seen on terra firma in quite a while), Kempsey Carolina and the babies (joeys Siren Gem and Lake Christmas [whom I've also never seen other than as a fuzzy blob on high]).

I can't resist popping my head in yard 9 to see if O'Briens Fiona is on the move. As usual, she's scuttling around begging for formula. I ask Geoff if he'd like some made up; I retire to the dayroom and beat up her double-dose of formula. By the time I get to yard 9, she's up a tree again. Fickle Fiona.

Kempsey Carolina
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I set out to feed our Kempsey, the blind permanent resident of yard 5 who never knocks back a feed. She's more dribblepuss than usual today, or maybe I'm just used to feeding koalas these days who are better at keeping it in their mouths. I do everything I can to keep the syringe high in the air, as Amanda first showed me. There's also the little trick of holding the syringe there once it's empty to encourage her to keep swallowing; the minute she lowers her head it all starts to slop out. Drops end up running down her chin, on her fur, on her leaf, on me. I manoeuvre the pot so that it's directly under her chin and this catches some of the run-off. As I fill the syringe, I notice little flecks of green: leaf pulp has mixed itself in with her dribbled formula.

At these close quarters, I find myself looking at Kempsey's eyes. Koala eyes are brown with a black almond-shape set vertically like a cat's. Kempsey's right eye is completely absent; all that remains is a sunken warp in the fur where the eye once was. I remember one of the uni vets telling me that the dead eye is worked out by the body (a case of abjection, if there ever was one); it heals over cleaner than any suture. Kempsey's left eye is intact, but blind. Instead of the almond cat's iris, there is a dun-coloured disc like a brown dilated pupil.

Dribbling aside, Kempsey is a pleasure to feed. She doesn't behave like the other, wild, koalas. She seems to have succumbed readily to her five-star care at the hospital. She accepts back scratches and chin tickles without resistance. Even wiping her face with a wet washer following her feed is a breeze compared to the other patients who usually move their face from side to side to avoid it: imagine the irritated face of a child submitting to having its face wiped by an overzealous mother.

Jarrod has finished in yards 4 and 6, so I duck my head into the aviaries to see if I can lend a hand. There are still three aviaries to do so I elect to clean the non-wet-bottoms, since I'm heading back into the healthy koalas yards again later when the new leaf arrives. Condon Geoff is in an aviary undergoing post-treatment monitoring. It seems that he has been successfully treated and, all going well, will be released soon. I'm especially pleased for him since he was the koala who seemed among the keenest to leave ICU.


Oceanview Terry
From koalawrangler's gallery.
As I enter, he's seated behind a veil of uneaten Swamp Mahogany and naked leaf fronds looking like a koala version of Buddha. He stares at me beatifically from his verdant mount as I start to rake up his soggy newspaper and the random smattering of poo, like so many spent shell casings.

I keep out of his way, taking the other leaf pot, emptying it, scrubbing out the leaf scum and refilling it in preparation for the fresh leaf. After the recent rain, the dirt comes up in moist chunks with the trowel. I refill his water bowl and turn to leaf.


Bellevue Bill
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Bellevue Bill gets sight of me from the aviary opposite. He stalks along his gunyah towards me like I have something he's after. Bill gets fed each day by the uni researchers. They're trialling him with some oral medication so perhaps he thinks I might have some tucker for him.

Oceanview Terry
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Next I start on Oceanview Terry. He's down the far end of his gunyah, completely swathed in leaf. He looks like he wants to be alone, so I leave him be and start on his floor. Not having a towel to replace on the gunyah is lot more koala-friendly. You can pretty much keep out of their way. Unexpectedly, Terry decides to break through the leafy veneer and see what I'm up to. He scrambles along the gunyah adeptly like a tightrope walker, restlessly looking for fresh leaf. It must make them anxious, not being able to search out new leaf when they're ready. Still, they get it handed to them on a platter each morning, so that's the next best thing.

I'm crouched on the ground relaying Terry's paper. I look up and he's staring down at me quizzically. I wonder what they make of the daily ablutions we carry out for them. It's a hospital, so they get fresh water, dirt, leaf and floor coverings every day, 365 days a year. I tell him the leaf won't be long now.

Melaleuca
From brokenpuzzle's gallery.

Time for a quick cuppa until Chris comes in and tells us the leaf's ready. He tells anyone who's listening that he's brought in a special lot of melaleuca for Anna Bay Miles. Miles is from Newcastle way, so it's a leaf he particularly likes. Apparently, when they had melaleuca earlier in the week, he wolfed down the bottlebrush-like flowers whole. Anything to build up his strength. I had seen Cheyne feeding him earlier on and mentioned to her that I'd seen him gnawing on his right knee yesterday. She hadn't heard about the behaviour so made a point of noting it down as something to watch for. It could signal some pain in that leg or his teeth.

With the leaf ready to go, we go back to the outside yards. Kempsey is ranging about on her gunyah so I feed her first, followed by the joeys. Next I fill Condon Geoff's empty pot. He gradually moves across to it, but tramples over the old leaf as he goes. I try gingerly to remove the old pot so that I can refill it with new leaf, but he eeps in protest. Okay, be that way. I remove the pot and leave behind the leaf he's sitting on, until he's distracted enough with eating the new leaf for me to whip the old out from under him.

Siren Gem
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I notice through the fence that Siren Gem is down in yard 6. Yippee! I get to feed him, which I've not done before. I go into the yard and he reaches out to me. He knows I have the potential to provide formula. I nip back to the dayroom and mix it up. He's reaching out for it by the time I get back. In between the syringes, his little tongue bobs in and out. Joeys are so compliant compared to their adult counterparts; having been raised in captivity, they aren't bothered by humans so long as we leave them be...and feed them on demand!

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Morrish Steven

On the way out I'm joined by Jim who tells me "I got chased by Sandfly Jye today". Tell me about it. One of the other vollies got Jim on video doing circuits around the gunyah with Jye in hot pursuit. If the guy wins Funniest Home Videos, Jim reckons he's entitled to at least half.

Morrish Steven
From koalawrangler's gallery.

It's a dark, grey day today, after a dark and stormy night (as Snoopy says in Peanuts). It rained for a good 45 minutes during the night so the grounds are all wet; the aviaries sodden; and I can only imagine that there are some dripping koalas up in yard 10.

I start the day in ICU, something I haven't done in a long time. This is the koala cutting edge -- all the newest arrivals wind up in these indoor cubicles where they're closely monitored. Morrish Steven and Lake Private are new inmates. Anna Bay Miles, Jupiter Cheryl and Innes Tony are still there. Innes Tony is a wet bottom, now with affected kidneys.

Tozer Tom has been brought back inside from yard 10. He kept knocking over his umbrella so they removed it, but he was getting drenched being out there without cover. He's asleep when I go in with his food. I draw up a stool and start talking to him gently. I tentatively push the syringe through the leaf towards his mouth and he starts to drink. I wonder whether he is really awake; every time I pause to refill the syringe, he bows his head and nods off.

I set out to start on the non-wet-bottom units before the wet-bottom ones. Lake Private has climbed down to the lower beam on his gunyah to get to his leaf. I decide to leave him to it and start down the other end.

Morrish Steven, a newcomer, looks at me with interest as I enter his unit. He's got a shiny grey tick on his left hind leg, right where his upper claws are dangling. I don't want to risk a swipe if I go to pluck it off front-on. Hopefully, he'll turn into his leaf more and provide me with a better opportunity. He's clearly been climbing up and down his gunyah, since there is a lot of bark shavings on the ground and the gunyah looks dishevelled.

Both of his leaf pots look like they've been trampled. Most of the branches are snapped and dangling over the edge of the leaf pot, out of reach. I collect the best leaf and trim it back and water it, before refilling his pot. He starts chewing the leaf eagerly like it's fresh. That will tide him over until the new stuff arrives. For some reason, there's no water or dirt, which I also fix. Steven turns towards the old-fresh leaf and I act fast: it takes two firm tugs to release the tick. It's not a full one, by any means, so it fits into one of the small phial in the dayroom.

Jupiter Cheryl
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Next I service Jupiter Cheryl's unit. She's perched in the middle of her gunyah, just looking out. Emma and Danae are working on the other units. I pop my head in Anna Bay Miles' unit. He's not a well koala. He keeps gnawing at his own knee. I'm not sue what that signifies. He's still around, which is good; but, I'm not sure for how long.

Anna Bay Miles
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I head outside to see if John needs help in the aviaries. He's still got Ellenborough Nancy to do. I'm drawn to her for some reason; she's a challenge. It all goes well this morning. I replace her towel down one end and am able to pat her bottom to shift her down the other end. She then decides to climb down and range around the floor. She doesn't seem too interested in me, although I keep an eye on her. I swiftly tie down the other towel in time for her to return to the gunyah. The floor is sodden after the rain; her newspaper is dripping wet and full of poop. I scoop it all up and lay new paper down thickly.

When the new leaf arrives, I help John finish the aviaries. Sweet little Condon Geoff tucks into the tallowwood leaf immediately. He's out here on post-treatment observation. Hopefully that means he'll be released soon.

Siren Gem
From koalawrangler's gallery.

The girls have finished the ICU by this time. Emma has managed to catch Siren Gem down from his tree and is feeding him his formula. I sneak a little pat while he's distracted with feeding, before heading home.

On the way out I'm joined by Jim who tells me "I got chased by Sandfly Jye today". Tell me about it. One of the other vollies got Jim on video doing circuits around the gunyah with Jye in hot pursuit. If the guy wins Funniest Home Videos, Jim reckons he's entitled to at least half.

Click here to view all of today's koala hospital photos.

Diary of a koala-feeding platform

The koala in the bag weighs a tonne, but I hold him out before me like the precious cargo he is. I have a momentary fantasy about being a swagman with a purloined jumbuck in my tucker bag.

O'Briens Fiona
From koalawrangler's gallery.

It's regular koalawrangling duties today, not teamleader training, so I start at 8am with the usual Friday crowd. Barb's friend Colleen is here and we are teamed together in yard 9. I'm glad about this since I'll get to see what antics our Fiona gets up to today.

I hear that Innes Wonga slated for release so his arthritic leg must have healed. There's a flurry of activity as vollies grab their respective feeding pots and head out to their assigned yards. Lucky Wiruna's and Birthday Girl's pot food is mixed up, but not O'Briens Fiona's or Bonny Fire's. Barb tells us that the latter two are still up trees. I tell her about yesterday's shenanigans with Fiona; I have a hunch she'll be down in no time once she sees the others being fed. Using my newfound formula-mixing skills, I quickly whip up her double dose (they're trying to fatten her up since she was underweight when re-admitted). I also grab a towel on the way through ICU; I'm determined not to be a koala's pin-cushion today.

In the yard, we locate Wiruna Lucky and Birthday Girl without too much trouble. Birthday Girl isn't on her usual gunyah, but she's much bigger than either Fiona or Bonny so I'm sure it's her. Lucky is distinguished by a splotchy pink nose, so is easy to spot. Colleen takes Lucky, donning some yellow washing-up gloves before she starts. She's obviously taken one look at those koala talons and doesn't want to risk a scratching. I take Birthday Girl, who eats gratefully.

O'Briens Fiona
From koalawrangler's gallery.

With a few syringe-fuls to go, I spot some fuzzy movement out of the corner of my eye. It's Fiona descending her tree as if by clockwork. In no time, she's bounding over to where I stand feeding Birthday Girl. Obviously, I can't crouch (to discourage Fiona from climbing me) and feed Birthday Girl at the same time. O'Briens Fiona is insistent; she wants her breakfast, and she plans on being irritating until she gets it. I give in to Fiona's urgency and ask Colleen if she'll finish feeding Birthday Girl after Lucky.

Grabbing Fiona's pot and a towel, I walk over where there's some raised astroturf under a gunyah, thinking it will be more comfortable than the crouched position I assumed yesterday. I sit down and cover my arm with a towel, expecting Fiona to sit beside me like any normal koala. But, no. My body is no impediment to Fiona's hunger and her wiley ways. She walks straight onto my lap like I'm a horizontal tree with some tasty swamp mahogany leaf in my fingers. I quickly stick the syringe in her mouth and she starts sucking away. Her claws are resting on my chest and I'm grateful for my smock as an added layer of protection. I may have avoided becoming a koala pin-cushion today, but I'm certainly a koala-feeding platform.

Fiona's sitting on my lap and I'm thankful the towel's under her in case she decides to pee. She's so light, she feels no heavier than my cat. I hold no illusions about this being an intimate moment between us. Her brown eyes are glassy and I know I'm nothing more than a tree trunk with with food on offer to her. I have to pause to refill the syringe and Fiona reaches for frantically for it, brooking no delay. I also feel that this is somehow wrong; I should be avoiding human contact with her as she's a wild animal. I generally don't touch the koalas at all, even to pat them on the back, since I'm aware that what might feel inexpressibly soft to us can be a form of invasion to them. But the feed is under way and I resolve to finish it before extricating myself.

Once the pot is dry, I lean to the side and Fiona slips off neatly onto the dirt. She shimmies up the nearest tree and assumes the position for the rest of the day...until the afternoon feed, that is. Bonny Fire shows no sign of coming down so we set about the yard duties. There's two recycle pots, which we replenish with the best of yesterday's leaf and place next to Lucky and Birthday Girl so that they have shelter while they sleep.

Ocean Kim
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Kimmy and Linksy in yard 9A are down from their trees and snuffling about in yesterday's Nichollii, their favourite leaf. We rake their yard, but leave the leaf until the fresh stuff arrives. There's little to do until the leaf-collector cometh, so we head to the day-room for a cuppa.

Jo emerges with a bag and asks if I'll bag Sandfly Jye. My teamleader/handling training continues. Jye is seated on a high fork in his gunyah and I'm wishing I were a foot taller as I fling the bag over his head. He resists, predictably. This time I've got a hold of his forearms as I've seen the other handlers do. I tell this to Jo and she instructs "well, pull him off". Jo's standing back letting me do it all; there's no point it wimping out and letting the more experienced one help. It's a bit like pulling staples out with your fingers; he's stuck to the wood like glue. Somehow or other I manage to get him off and enclosed in the bag. During the whole process, I'm murmuring a litany of soothing words, trying to stave off the koala's fear. It's funny how you do some things automatically. I hand the koala bagful over to Jo. I asked jokingly if she thought the verbal encouragement helped. "Well, it helped you anyway", she says.

I return to the day-room, triumphant. Soon enough, Jo reemerges from the treatment room toting a heavy bag. They've finished with Jye; can I return him? He weighs a tonne, but I hold him out before me like the precious cargo he is. I have a momentary fantasy about being a swagman with a purloined jumbuck in my tucker bag. I gently lower Jye to the ground of his unit and open the mouth of the bag to let him find his way back. He ambles out, slightly disoriented, and seeks out his gunyah for comfort.

When the leaf does arrive, there is a strange leaf I haven't seen before. The bark is papery and black, and the branches zigzag at crazy angles. It sports fluffy yellow flowers like bottlebrush and has the most intense lemony-camphor smell of any eucalypt I've come across. Danae views it suspiciously, but Barb assures us that the koalas love to eat the flowers. It's a melaleuca, which gives me bittersweet memories of poor Melaleuca Alfie.


Links VTR
From koalawrangler's gallery.
The joeys in yard 9A, bound down from their tree and tuck into their leaf. Barb comes out to check on Links VTR. She has a word to me about O'Briens Fiona. Next time she does the crawling act I should just pick her up and plonk her on a gunyah to feed; we don't want koalas trying to crawl over people in the street looking for formula once they're released... Now that I'm more adept at handling them, it's probably something I could feel comfortable doing. Ask me to pick up a koala last week and it would have been a different story.

Barb makes off with Links VTR in her arms in order to weigh him. He's perched over her shoulder looking at at the world just like my cat does. When he returns, we learn that he's just under 3.5kg. They won't release him until he gets more comfortable with climbing. Barb explains that Links just doesn't display the usual koala desire of wanting to be high up in a tree. He would prefer to be down low where there's the eucalyptus version of a Sizzler salad bar. He's even developing a bit of a paunch.

Barb & Links VTR
From koalawrangler's gallery.

As Barb returns him to the tree, she places her hand under his bottom and tells him in a mock-berating tone to climb up the tree, not down. Linksy reaches out his bent little nose and sniffs her. I know it's not an affectionate gesture, but it really looks like one from our human vantage point.

With the leaf pots all replenished, I rake up the excess and dump it at the leaf skip. Jo is passing by on her way to yard 10 with another empty bag, this one destined for Oxley Jo. Do I want to bag her? I'll just have to give up on Oxley Jo wanting to be my best friend. She's a little easier than Jye to bag since she's so small, like a big joey. Jo stands in front of her to distract her while I sneak up on her behind with a bag. I pop it over her head and she starts to eep wildly in protest. I feel for her wrists again and try to wrench them as gently as possible from the gunyah. I recall that if you pull them slightly apart, the koala has to let go. She sort of drops into the bag at this point, and I let the bag ease to the ground. Her bottom is wriggling out the mouth of the bag and I scramble to close it around her.

Jo says I've done a good job. The main thing is not to drop the koala! Check! I think I'd probably throw myself under a falling koala before I'd let that happen. She also says that you can have all the koala-bagging experience in the world, but a bagging can still go wrong. I should take heart at this.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Et tu, koalawrangler?

When I return to Sandfly Jye to continue fixing his leaf, he's on the ground. Nothing strange about that, except as soon as he sees me, he bolts straight towards me. What is it with stampeding koalas today? Could it be the Ides of March?

Sandfly Jye
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Amanda has assigned her and me to yard 10, along with John, the inside vollie who's now working at the koala-face. John and I head up to yard 10, feed pots in hand. Jo is just departing after doing her poop and leaf rounds. I explain to John the all-important rule always to wait until a uni researcher has given the all-clear in yard 10, ICU or the aviaries.

Tractive is up a tree, but Therese is down so John starts feeding her. There are a number of new residents in yard 10 since I was last here. Lookout Harry from the aviaries has moved into Macquarie Peter's old unit. Sandfly Jye, the piggy-nosed koala whose intensive care unit I mopped out last Thursday, is next to Warrego Martin. Ocean Roy is coming up from ICU so we're to set up a new unit on the other side of Jye. Tozer Tom has been moved back into ICU pending release.

I put out the collection boxes earlier, but wasn't sure that I'd put them in the best places. Amanda suggests one of the boxes from yard 9 should come up to yard 10. I head down there to retrieve it and see that the vollies there are feeding two of the koalas. One of them pleads with me to feed O'Briens Fiona. I go to ask where she is, when I see her on the ground at one of the girls' feet. The other koalas have been fed ahead of her and she's not pleased. I pick up her feed pot and she bounds towards me like a puppy...a puppy with huge, curved talon-like claws... I've fed her before, but only ever on a gunyah; this ground thing is new. She's so pushy. I crouch down and start gently syphoning the formula into her mouth, but she keeps flailing her arms towards me. It's not enough that the syringe is in her mouth; she's got to be holding onto something. It makes sense: when they eat, they are usually yanking leaf towards them, or at least holding onto a tree.

One flailing arm finally finds purchase in my bare forearm. She's not clawing to hurt me, so I'm not worried; he just wants me in her grip. To her, I'm basically a food supply. The claws don't draw blood; only pinch a little. The main trouble is that it's my feeding arm and I need to keep refilling the syringe. I get one of the ladies to hold the feed pot while I lean into Fiona to release her grip. The claws don't retract so the only way to pull free is not to pull, but to push gently towards them. I dash into the ICU, grab a towel and return. Fiona has ambled off and is harrassing another vollie. I draw her over with the syringe and, with a towel now covering my arm, continue to feed her. She is insistent about the food, like she's famished. Once it's gone, however, she bounds off up a tree and is gone. Eats, shoots and leaves.


Links Lorna
From koalawrangler's gallery.
I return to yard 10 with the collection box and make my apologies to Amanda. I head down to start on Links Lorna who looks remarkably relaxed, nestled in her leaf like a furry cabbage. She squints at me dozily, and doesn't even eep at me once. I rake around her yard, replace her water, and then empty the leaf at the other end of the gunyah. Next, I start on Sandfly Jye. He has such an unique little face with is always-flared nostrils framed in pink. He sits calmly on his gunyah without a peep.

Uni vet Jo arrives to do her medicating rounds. This time she's armed with a towel-covered stick to distract Oxley Jo. The stick ups the ante from simply having a madwoman yelling standing in front of Oxley Jo yelling "la la la"; Jo now needs instrumental distraction. When I return to Sandfly Jye to continue fixing his leaf, he's on the ground. Nothing strange about that, except as soon as he sees me, he bolts straight towards me. What is it with stampeding koalas today? First Fiona now Jye. Could it be the Ides of March? Snagglepus-like, I exit stage left, grabbing the rake off the ground just in time to put between Jye and myself. I'm certain that if I don't, he may climb me!

As I rush out of the yard with Jye in hot pursuit, Jo and Amanda are heading my way and explain Jye's behaviour. Jo has to give him some oral medication, so she decides it's best to bag him and plant him on the leaf rack to administer it. Amanda tells Jo that I'm trying to get experience handling the koalas. Jo waves the bag at me and I open the gate like it's a lion's den.

Jo gives me some pointers. You can't be tentative: you throw the bag over confidently and follow through. It's the quick and the dead in the fast-paced world of koala-bagging. Tentative is exactly how I feel. Jye is back on his gunyah now. Under Jo's guidance, I fling the bag over his head. The complication is that they're never just sitting there; they're firmly gripping a fork of wood. So this goes in the bag too and the koala is not about to let go. Instead, the koala is doing everything it can to nose its way out of the bag. Furthermore, with the bag over the koala, you lose track of which bit of the koala is where. Jo is giving me instructions like "grab his wrists" and most of it is going in one ear and out the other. Somehow, finally, it's done. One koala, bagged.

Ocean Roy arrives from ICU and is plonked in his new yard. He appears to like his umbrella. I carry on cleaning Jye's yard while he's otherwise occupied on the leaf rack. If a koala needs to be fed and they're not very used to feeding, it's easier to bag them and then only let the head of the koala out of the bag to feed. They tend to take the formula uncomplainingly in that position. Jo has to take another koala back to the treatment room and suggests I give the bagging a go. It's Lookout Harry this time. He's up high on his perch and have trouble with this one, although it all works in the end, with Jo's help. Jo says you get the hang of it after you've bagged 20 or so koalas...


Amanda & Sandfly Jye
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Even after his feed, Jye still won't stop chasing me around his yard. He starts running and then I start running, and then pretty soon we're doing laps around his gunyah. Amanda is next door and keeps saying "just crouch down, he won't do anything and he'll stop running". I find this hard to believe so she comes in and demonstrates. Sure enough, as soon as she crouches down, Jye comes to a halt and just sits and looks in front of her. It's just not what I expected to happen. Amanda looks so at ease, you can tell she's been doing this for three years.

Tractive Golfer
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Just as John is preparing Lookout Harry's leaf, I see Tractive Golfer backing down his tree. He shambles over towards us and predictably starts chewing on the leaf overhanging the leaf rack. He even climbs a leg of the leaf rack and noses around the under the leaf from there. Using a branch as a lure, I draw Golfer away towards his own leaf. It's a tried-and-true method I was Yasmin use so successfully in the past. He follows happily enough and settles onto his gunyah for a good feed.

The new leaf arrives and we start to replenish the pots. Links Lorna, formerly so calm, decides she's not giving up her leafy cushioning without a peep or two. I gently try to dislodge her from her spot and she eeps her disgruntlement. Amanda has given me a little more formula to feed Sandfly Jye. We reckon he might still be a bit hungry since some of his mixture spilt while he was being fed on the leaf rack. I also saw him sitting on the ground of his yard, which made me think Imight have tuckered him out. He's interested in the food for a while as I dribble it into his mouth; then he starts moving his head away.

Back in the day-room, I flick through the post-mortem reports. I see that it was necessary to euthanase poor Crestwood Dampier, the adult male that Barb was looking after. It was determined that his lack of movement in the hindquarters was actually paralysis. He wouldn't have stood a chance of surviving in the wild. It was more humane to send him to that great gumtree in the sky.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Teamleader 101

Amanda tells me it's important to look for any abnormal whiteness in the faeces, which could be pus or mucus. I think I see some suspect poo in Cathie Sampson's yard and go over all Sherlock Holmes.

Cathie Sampson
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Amanda wants to train me up as a back-up team-leader for the times that she, and potentially other team-leaders, can't make it for some reason. Today is the first day that I learn the ropes, and this will also mean being brave and volunteering to do the necessary handling. Being comfortable with handling is also necessary if I want to help in rescues some time in the future.

As a team-leader, Amanda starts at 7am as she has a range of duties to get through before the volunteers arrive at 8am. The leaf-collector has already been and gone by this time, taking the truck to collect the day's supply of fresh leaf. The first thing a team-leader does is check that the koalas in ICU are all okay. These are the sickest koalas in the hospital so there is always a possibility that one might take a turn for the worse during the night. If a koala is lying on the floor of their unit (as opposed to just prowling around on the floor, which they often do), it should be made warm by nestling it into a basket with towels like they do on rescues. There are also hot-water bottles in the treatment room, if necessary.
Assuming the ICU koalas are all okay, the next job is to read the leaf and poo for all the koalas not on the university research testing program (the uni researchers read their leaf and poo every morning). Amanda draws up a matrix showing the names of the all the koalas down one side and a list of leaf varieties across the top. The leaf-collector scribbles little codes in the day-book to indicate which leaf they have brought in that day: "SM" for swamp mahogany, "N" for nicholii, plus a host of other acronyms we're not sure of. This is a job of differentiation rather than identification; once we work out one leaf, we can generally tell the others by a process of elimination. Most of the non-uni koalas get recycle pots too, so the names of yesterday's leaf is also jotted along the top. This also helps with differentiating the leaf codes. Saussure would have a field day with this, I'm sure.

We start with Oxley Westi in yard 1 and then proceed through yards 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 9. We check that the poo looks okay: Amanda tells me it's important to look for any abnormal whiteness in the faeces, which could be pus or mucus. I think I see some suspect poo in Cathie Sampson's yard and go over all Sherlock Holmes. Amanda tells me that my sample is simply very fresh poo, which sports a glistening whiteness before it starts to dry out. Apparently, you just get to know mucusy poo when you see it. Ah, the arcane wisdom of the koalawrangling team-leader!

Most of the koalas have made a meal (geddit?) of swamp mahogany as usual; these branches are crowned in leafless spikes. Amanda puts little up arrows in the column when the koala has eaten a lot of that particular variety. They also get a tick if they produce a lot of poo; but it's more complicated than this. I'll have to get the hang of the symbols and their meanings before I would feel confident in my poo- and leaf-reading abilities.

As we wander around, Amanda opens the various doors and gates -- the laundry, yard 10. We head up to yard 10 to read Golfer's and Therese's leaf and then head back to the day-room to prepare the day's formula. There are two types of formula and two possible dosage amounts; some get an additional nutritional gel, while others get no food at all. Still others get drugs administered by the uni researchers and hospital supervisors, so those koalas' food goes into the treatment room so that the vollies don't go off and feed the koalas by accident. The feeding schedule is written up on the whiteboards that advise amount and type of formula and whether vollies can administer or whether the koala is undergoing a medication schedule. I'm pleased to see that Anna Bay Miles is still with us, given his debilitated and quite smelly state when I helped Cheyne feed her the other day. Hopefully that means he's responding to hospital care.

I've only ever washed up the feeding pots, not prepared them; and there's even a procedure attached to that. The pots and syringes soak overnight in an antibacterial solution, so they need to be rinsed clean of that. Amanda also uses a bit of paraffin wax to lubricate the syringes. Amanda separates the pots for each type of formula and dosage. We prepare the four yard 9 girls' food and set them aside in a tray. Three pots go into the treatment room for the vet staff. It's coming up to 8am, so it's time for me to doff my trainee team-leader hat and resume my vollie hat (and smock!) for a morning of koalawrangling.

On the koala side of the street

They don't call it Koala Street for nothing...

Ocean Roy
From brokenpuzzle's gallery.

There's a street here in Port Macquarie called "Koala Street". It connects Ocean Drive with Kennedy Drive and is one of the few streets in Port that has a 60km/hr speed limit (rather than the usual 50km/hr).

Despite the street's claim, I've never personally seen a koala in that street, and so until today I thought it was an arbitrary rather than descriptive label. Then, driving up Koala Street this afternoon, I had a closer look at the side streets off the main Koala Street artery and saw the following names loom up at me in quick succession:

* O'Briens Road
* Treetop Crescent
* Tasman Road

The side streets have all contributed names to koalas that have been brought into our care at the hospital; to wit:

* O'Briens Road > O'Briens Fiona
* Treetop Crescent > Treetop Boxer
* Tasman Road > Tasman Rose

The koalas admitted to the hospital are given two names: the first is the name of the street (or town) where they're found; the second is the name of the person who found the koala or contributed to its rescue.

I was reading the Country Energy newletter the other day and it had an article about a rescue rescue they helped out with. Country Energy (CE) brought in their cherry-picker (or elevated work platform, as they call it) to help retrieve a koala from a tree overhanging a busy road and near overhead powerlines. Chris Rowland, from the koala hospital, assisted in the rescue, but the salvaged koala was named after Roy Morgan, a CE employee.


From Country Energy's wildlife page.
"Roy" was rescued from the corner of Ocean Drive and Koala Street so they called him "Ocean Roy"; I guess "Koala Roy" would have been stating the obvious! Anyway, it proves they don't call it's called Koala Street for good reason!

Ellenborough Nancy: real wild child

Jo emerges, momentarily beaten by Nancy's loopiness, and announces "I'm gonna have to bag her".

Bellevue Bill
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I'm working with Danae in the aviaries this morning. She's been here twice a day, every day, for a week now, so she's an old hand. The aviaries occupy their own small yard which is reached by a gate near the leaf shed. If a koala somehow got out of an aviary while we were cleaning it, the animal would have to negotiate the gate before reaching the outside world. Saying that, I reckon O'Briens Fiona could probably manage to scale it...she's a wiley thing!

Danae has already emptied one of Bellevue Bill's leaf pots. Danae has started feeding Bellevue Bill who seems to enjoy it, although he keeps an eye on me throughout the feed. Cheyne, the hospital supervisor, comes in to do her rounds, clipboard in hand. Before volunteers touch leaf in the aviaries (as well as the smaller yards in yard 10), each one has to be checked and "read" for the details that the koalas themselves can't tell us about their recovery. I go to start cleaning Oceanview Terry's aviary when Jo's voice sounds over the fence "wait! wait! I still need to check the aviaries".

I didn't realise that BOTH the supervisor and a member of the Sydney Uni team needs to examine the koalas' units and yards. Until then, I thought that Cheyne's doing the rounds was enough; but apparently they look for different things. One check they both do every morning is to "read the leaf". This means scrutinising the leaf bunches to see how much each koala has eaten and which type of eucalyptus. This serves at least two purposes: to ensure that the leaf collectors are gathering the kind of leaf the koalas are eating, and to gauge whether the koala is demonstrating a healthy appetite. They also look at how much poo is on the ground ("reading the poo", I suppose) as this contributes to the overall picture of the koala's health. The uni researchers also take poo samples from each koala for testing. Jo is armed with little zip-lock baggies for the purpose. I'm still holding a bunch of leaf from Terry's unit and she makes a quick survey of the bundle and jots down some notes on a clipboard.

We're now free to carry on cleaning. Oceanview Terry is fast asleep under an arc of leaf so I empty the other pot, roll up the damp newspaper and replenish his dirt and water. There's no towel to change so it's a quick turnaround. There are some French tourists visiting the hospital so Danae pauses to give them some info about the hospital in their native tongue. The French is punctuated by the odd English word or expression. I hear "wet bottom" a couple of times, describing the ailment commonly suffered by koalas affected by Chlamydia. I wonder why Danae wouldn't have translated the term into French somehow, maybe derrière mouillé?

The new leaf is still not ready so I brave Ellenborough Nancy's aviary. She's sitting quietly down on end of her gunyah, so I gradually cut the old towel off the other end and sneak the clean towel on. With other koalas you can gently prod them to vacate the dirty end in order to replace the towel there. Not with Nancy. She's too much of a wild-thing. I keep thinking she must have been named after that other wild-child, Nancy Spungen, girlfriend to Sid Vicious of Sex Pistols fame.

Nancy decides she's going to climb down to the ground. I work as fast as I can to tie on the towel to the rest of the gunyah. I unravel the second new towel and wonder if she'll snatch at it like a rag to a bull as she did last time. Fortunately she's more interested in leaning up against the door and peering outside. All the while I'm tying the new towel on, I'm shooting her glances; her extra-wildness makes her unpredictable so she's not a koala you want to turn your back on.


Ellenborough Nancy
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Jo turns up again, with more medication for the koalas. Both the boys take treat her entrance with stoicism. Danae and I hold our breath as Jo goes in to medicate Nancy. Nancy's aviary faces the joey yard, so we can't see what's going on in there from outside. Jo emerges, momentarily beaten by Nancy's loopiness, and announces "I'm gonna have to bag her": bagging a koala for treatment often lessens their distress. She returns with said bag (each outdoor koala has their own dedicated bag kept in a named compartment in the treatment room) and slips Nancy inside. We can still see her wriggling about under the canvas.

With Nancy gone, I dive into her unit, keen to take advantage of its being koala-free. I quickly sweep up her wet newspaper, finding a couple of ticks in the process, which I pocket for later processing. I'm only just starting to lay the dry newspaper when Barb appears with the Nancy bag. "Oh no, already?", I lament. She laughs. Barb lets Nancy ease herself out of the bag at her own pace and climb back on the gunyah. She's clearly subdued after her trip to the treatment room; I give her plenty of space, finishing the cleaning and leaving quietly.

I should qualify that beneath my mock characterisations of Nancy as a scary beast is my desire to see her recuperate and be released; I really can't wait till she's back amid those soaring gums of Ellenborough where she belongs. You can see the improvement in Ellenborough Nancy's infected left eye in only a few weeks. Glad to see her treatment's doing her some good.

Two weeks ago Ellenborough Nancy From koalawrangler's gallery.

Now Ellenborough Nancy From koalawrangler's gallery.

We learn that the fresh leaf is ready so set about replenishing the leaf pots. Back in the day-room I write up and bottle Nancy's ticks. I hear that there's been a motor vehicle accident near the corner of Ocean and Pacific Drive. Peter sets off on the rescue. With the aviaries done, Danae and I see what we can do to help in the ICU. Barb allocates Danae Innes Tony in unit 1 and me Condon Geoff in unit 4. Helen and Anne are next door with Ocean Roy.

Condon Geoff is the koala who would wedge himself in the space above the door of his unit in ICU. When he graduated to yard 10, he pushed over his umbrella in his smaller yard and took off up a tree in the main part of yard 10. He's back in the units where the staff can keep an eye on him. He's far up the end of his gunyah nearest the door when I enter so I set about doing the towel at the other end. I don't want to shift him more than necessary so I go out to prepare his leaf to make it an easy swap job.

Barb tells me in hushed tones that we shouldn't touch Golf Starr's unit. Her illness is too far progressed for her to recover. Instead, she will be going to that great gumtree in the sky. I remember how upsetting I found it when I first started at the hosptial and learned that little Dunbogan Val was not going to make it through the night. It still saddens me becoming so close to these animals, caring for them, and then facing the inevitable situation that some will never make it outside the hospital. But that is the nature of a hospital. I console myself that they pass away painlessly and with dignity. In addition, it's good to know that the researchers are learning something from each koala they treat which contributes to their knowledge of koala dissease. Ultimately, this benefits the koala population as a whole.

I return to Geoff and place a newly wetted bunch of leaf down the end with the clean towel. I gently lift the bunch he's hiding behind at the other end. He eeps briefly so I leave him be and go to wash and fill the other pot. When I return, he's still sitting there in the open when there's a perfectly delicious new bunch of leaf awaiting him down the other end. He's obviously a koala of habit and is attached to his usual spot. His back is facing the opposite direction to where I want him to go. My mere presence in the unit is causing his ears to flick. It's such a subtle gesture, but I now know how to read some of the signs of their fear or discomfort. The "conversation" between koala and human is rarely overblown.


Condon Geoff
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Rather than touch him, I gently tug at the old towel beneath him. Again he eeps his refusal. Finally, he gets the hint and ambles down the other end to the fresh leaf. Within seconds, I can hear him chomping away, now oblivious to my presence, how he got there probably forgotten. With Geoff fully occupied, I can now mop and paper the floor without resistance.

On my way out, I peer into the treatment room to see Cheyne examining the new admission. Barb is also feeding a koala in a basket. Peter comes outside to join us at the window. He's covered in scratches from the rescue. He explains that the koala with Barb is Crestwood Dampier, a koala with damaged hindquarters that she is caring for at home. He's a big boy, not like the little joeys she normally looks after.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Distracting Jo

In both units I discover little caches of koala poo tucked into corners or squeezed under the wooden beams. Koala surprise!

Lookout Harry
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Today I'm back in the aviaries, which is fine since I've not mucked these out for a while. Tricia and Danae are in yard 9, Paul's doing yards 1-3 and Ross is in yard 10 on his own, which he prefers. Amanda is training up John, who usually does data entry in the office; they're doing yards 5 and 6. Amanda tells me not to do Lookout Harry's aviary since he's being moved to a yard; no point in bothering him if he's going to new digs. This leaves three other units: Oceanview Terry, Bellevue Bill and da da da daaa Ellenborough Nancy. I always seem to leave Nancy till last for some reason...

Just before I start on Terry, Jo the vet calls to me for a hand with Oxley Jo. Many of the koalas on the Sydney uni drug trials get shots administered by the vets. Oxley Jo has this habit of not taking her eyes off you the whole time you're in her yard; her eyes follow you like those old paintings in gothic horror stories... This makes it hard to administer her medication. Jo wants me to 'distract' Oxley Jo while she gives her the shot. Ulp! Okay.

Predictably, Oxley Jo twists her little head to follow vet Jo when she enters the yard. But I've complicated matters by bringing up the rear; there's one of us front and back: she doesn't know which way to look. I start acting like a crazy woman, waving my arms in front of her face and going "la la la la" -- anything to keep her focused on me. When she turns towards vet Jo, I gently touch her paws and to keep her facing the front. It's all over as quickly as it's begun, but I tell Jo that she's still foiled my hopes of winning Oxley Jo over for good.

Back in the aviaries, Terry is conveniently down on the left by his leaf pot. This leaves me free to clean down the other end. Water and dirt put out the door, check. One leaf pot emptied and scrubbed, check. Poopy paper raked up and in the bin, check. Fortunately, his gunyah doesn't need a towel so it's a fast turnaround.

Jarrod has finished yard 4 and so starts in the aviaries. I'm out dumping some old leaf in the skip and return to find him rolling up Lookout Harry's paper. I quickly let him know that we're leaving him till last due to his impending move. Jarrod starts on Bellevue Bill.

I go into the day-room for a swig of water and see Cheyne in the treatment room with a sickly looking koala. He's sitting on the treatment table lapping up formula from a syringe. I remark that he looks so tame; Cheyne says that "tame" is never a term you want to find yourself using about a wild koala. It's Anna Bay Miles, the one whose diagnosis is "debilitated". He keeps backing away from the syringe so I step in to stand behind him and keep him on the bench. He's a wet bottom and the smell is overpowering. I really hope he'll be able to turn a corner, but the prognosis isn't good. Cheyne suggests I take off my smock, which has been pressed against Miles' wet bottom, to prevent infecting any of the other koalas.


Anna Bay Miles
From koalawrangler's gallery.

Jo comes into the aviaries to medicates the required koalas. Lookout Harry is unimpressed. Ellenborough Nancy is placid, but swings around at the last minute and prevents Jo from finishing the dose. I wouldn't want to take Nancy on when she's got a grump on. Now it's time for me to brave Ellenborough Nancy's unit. Ulp. She's actually in the corner, against the wall, which allows me to completely strip one side of her gunyah and replace the towel. The leaf isn't ready yet so most of the team takes an early tea break.

When I return with newspaper for Nancy's floor, she's still down the unclean end. I decide to wait till she moves of her own accord with the lure of fresh leaf before tackling the remaining towel. We learn that the leaf has arrived and suddenly all the racks are full of fluffy leaf and everyone is clipping away. Amanda is giving John her usual rigorous leaf-cutting tuition. I ask John if this is his first day in the yards, after his indoor duties. I tell him that this is the cutting edge of koala-wranging. "At the coal-face", he says". The koala-face, more like :)


Ellenborough Nancy
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Nancy finally moves so I can finish her gunyah. When I go in to stock up Oceanview Terry's leaf, he's still hovering around the remaining leaf pot. I talk to him quietly and gently brush his back so he knows I'm there. I reach for his leaf pot and startle him (despite what I thought was a huge build-up!). For one horrifying second, it looks like he's about to fall off his perch; instead he swivels from on top of the gunyah to beneath it, hanging on grimly. Oh no, I've knocked a sick koala off his gunyah! Well, not knocked, but frightened perhaps. Poor fellow! He climbs back up without incident, but I give him losts of fluffy wet leaf to compensate.

Lookout Harry is roaming around his unit; he's probably after some fresh leaf. He keeps standing on his hind legs and peering through the mesh. Lookout Harry, on the lookout. Amanda comes to retrieve him in a bag and shift him to yard 10. All that remains is for his aviary to be given a full clean. I need to check with Amanda exactly what is involved. I check with Jackie in ICU whether I can help with the units in there. Sandfly Jye has been moved so his unit needs a full clean also. I start mopping with bleach water, the walls and skirting boards. It's hard work.

I take a tea break in the dayroom and flick through the post-mortem reports which the vets file in a plastic binder for the vollies' information. Through it, I learn that Melaleuca Alfie, the one with damaged genitals from where a car clipped him, has been euthanased. He was such a bright koala; it's hard to see his life cut short. I ask Jo why these are called "necropsy" reports and not "autopsy". It's because the prefix "auto-" means "self"; a human carrying out a post-mortem on another person is an autopsy since they are the same species. Necropsies are carried out on other species.

I finish mopping Sandfly Jye's unit and soak his pots, broom and dust-pan in bleach and water. I do the same for Lookout Henry's aviary. Mopping out the aviary is even harder work that the unit. The mop is almost too long, yet I have to negotiate it around the walls, which are covered in mud from Harry's antics. In both units I discover little caches of koala poo tucked into corners or squeezed under the wooden beams. Koala surprise!

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.

Wednesday

Cheyne is Chief Koalawrangler and you can tell by her confidence handling the koalas. She deftly plonks Tom on his gunyah; nonplussed, Tom tucks straight into his wet leaf and is immediately in the 'zone'.

Ocean Therese
From koalawrangler's gallery.

I've been asked to fill for in Maggie on the Wednesday afternoon shift for the next two weeks. There are a host of people in the day-room when I enter: Cathy, the teamleader; a lady called Joy; Anne from Fridays who's working in the shop; Danae, the French backpacker; and Geoff, who's doing today's 3pm walk-and-talk.

Without much to do before 3pm, I wander through the yard. Burraneer Henry is, as ever, up his tree; this time his arms are dangling down in a comical gesture. Back inside, Cathy is mixing up formula and starts to tell us some koala tales. For instance, wiley O'Briens Fiona escaped AGAIN this morning. She has been moved to yard 9 with the permanent girls, but was found up a tree outside her yard in the main grounds. At least she doesn't go far. Fortunately, they've identified how it is she escaped and so have foiled her plans for the future. There have been other movements too. Cathie Sampson has been moved to Fiona's old spot in yard 3 and Jupiter Cheryl has taken his unit in ICU.


Burraneer Henry
From koalawrangler's gallery.
Three koalas need to be fed in the front yards: Innes Wonga, Kempsey Carolina and Siren Gem, the joey. Gem is snuggled up a tree so I start feeding Kempsey. She wakes up as I pull the stool over and starts to move towards me. A crowd gathers at the fence just as a realise that the syringe is a bit dodgy; I can't exactly vacate my post and seek out another. It's as though the plunger is too small for the cylinder -- it just slips through with no pressure. Kempsey is enough of a dribbler without the syringe dribbling to begin with.

Joy is in yard 9 feeding O'Briens Fiona. It's so strange to see her in the wide expanses of yard 9, and with the old girls. She's seated at the end of gunyah beam, pitching towards Joy. In between drinks, she pokes her tongue in and out, like she's licking the air. Bonny Fire is shambling along a nearby beam; she was up a tree earlier so they haven't mixed formula for her yet. Cathy is watering the kids in yard 9A.

Wiruna Lucky is lounging nakedly on a nearby beam. Joy has moved aside the leaf pots so that the tourists can see; Lucky is completely exposed, but sleepily stretched out on the beam. I start to feed her and she drinks it in without moving. "Don't get up now", I mumble.

Joy is happy to feed Birthday Girl and water in yard 9 so I check on where Danae is at outside. She's watered Wonga and Sampson; I water Henry and Westi. Gem is still up his tree although he stirs; not enough to come down to feed though.

I head round to yard 10 where Danae is trying to work out which is Tractive Golfer and which is Ocean Therese. Surprisingly, both are down on their gunyahs. I suggest that Danae feeds Tom since there's a crowd around the front row. I interrupt Ocean Therese who is eating her leaf. She is happy to take the formula. I'm having no luck with syringes today. The black rubber bit comes off the plunger and embeds inself into the syringe. Danae gives up on feeding Tom who has lost interest in formula and returned to his leaf. Just then Cathy comes into the yard with Warrego Martin in a basket. I open up his yard and she lets him out. He leaps onto the beam and straight up to the highest point of his gunyah. Cathy pops Tom in the basket and takes him off to ICU.

Danae starts feeding Tractive Golfer while I water Oxley Jo then Links Lorna. Bizarrely Lorna is sitting out in the middle of her gunyah and seeminly unbothered by my presence. It's so not like her not to be hiding and eeping weakly into her leaf. Cheyne returns with Tozer Tom swinging between her arms. Cheyne is Chief Koalawrangler and you can tell by her confidence handling the koalas. She deftly plonks Tom on his gunyah; nonplussed, Tom tucks straight into his wet leaf and is immediately in the 'zone'.

Links Lorna From koalawrangler's gallery.

Tozer Tom From koalawrangler's gallery.

I return to the day-room for another syringe to finish feeding Ocean Therese. I look for Cathy and find her in the treatment room with Jo who is taking a photo of a large jar of brownish liquid. Jo gives me a new syringe and chucks the old one in the bin. Back with Therese, she's got a mouthful of leaf, but pauses to finish off the formula.

Danae waters the aviaries while I wash the formula pots. Jo is in the day-room having a late lunch so I take the opportunity to find out about a few of the koalas' conditions. Golf Starr, a koala who was found lethargic and low in a tree, has a poor prognosis as a result of Chlamydia complications. She has paraovarian cysts, thickened bladder and hydro-ureter kidney (ie the ureter has dilated into the kidney). They are waiting on blood results.

We also talk about Oxley Westi who has the exopthalmous eyes in yard 1. Apparently, they don't know what causes it. I comment that they don't seem to have improved, but Jo says that sometimes she pulls them in and sometimes she doesn't. It's an ability some animals have. We also talk about little Ocean Casurina, who I remember feeding some weeks back. Apparently she had a pinky when she was release, so perhaps she's a mother?

There's another admission, Anna Bay Miles, who's been brought in under the auspices of a wildlife trust. I also read in the day-book that there's also a koala called Crestwood Dampier, who I can't see on any of the whiteboards. It turns out she's in home-care with Barb. On a sad note, I see that Treetop Boxer was brought in a few days ago. He was found on the ground with a distended stomach. He was discovered to have cancer and was euthanased! I remember so well my second day when Geoff transferred Boxer to yard 10A before he was released only a few weeks back. At least his pain was put to an end.

Before I go, Cathy shows me and Danae how to prepare a rescue basket. It contains a pillow sealed in a garbage bag, in case they pee. You cover that in two towels and then fold another two towels length-ways so that it lines the edge of the basket cocoon-style. Finally, you insert a rolled-up towel in the centre that mimicks a "tree" for them to hold on to. Aw.

Click here to view more of today's koala hospital photos.