Tammar wallaby

Tammar wallaby

The tammar wallaby is a small macropod native to South and Western Australia. It has been introduced to New Zealand and reintroduced to some areas of Australia where it had been previously eradicated. The species is a model species for research on marsupials, and on mammals in general. It exhibits sexual dimorphism, with the maximum weight in males being 9kg and in females 6kg.

About Tammar wallaby in brief

Summary Tammar wallabyThe tammar wallaby is a small macropod native to South and Western Australia. It has been introduced to New Zealand and reintroduced to some areas of Australia where it had been previously eradicated. It is among the smallest of the wallabies in the genus Macropus. The species is a model species for research on marsupials, and on mammals in general. It exhibits sexual dimorphism, with the maximum weight in males being 9kg and in females 6kg. It was first described in 1817 by the French naturalist Anselme Gaëtan Desmarest, who gave it the name eugenii based on where it was found. The common name of the animal is derived from the thickets of the shrub locally known as tamma that sheltered it in Western Australia and is also known as the dama wallaby or darma wallaby. The tammarwallaby is classified together with the kangaroos, wallaroos and several other species of wallaby in the  genus Macropus, and in the subgenus Notamacropus with the other brush wallabies, all of which have a facial stripe. Fossil evidence of the tam mar wallaby exists from the Late Pleistocene Era – remains were found in the Naracoorte Caves. The mainland and island-dwelling tammar Wallabies split from each other 7,000–15,000 years ago,: 332 while the South Australian and Western Australian animals diverged around 50,000 year ago.

The island tammarWallabies were once thought to be a separate species from the mainland population. The Western Australia Department of Environment listed them as the subspecies M. derbianus, Mugenii and decres respectively. The Tammar Wallaby has a small head and large ears with a thick tail, thick at the base, and a dark grey-brown upperparts with paler grey, rufous upperparts on the upper limbs. Males are 68cm in length in males, particularly in pale grey-buff males, and pale grey underparts in females. Males can nurse a joey in her pouch while keeping an embryo in her uterus. A female tammar wallsaby can keep an embryo inside her uterus while giving birth to a baby joey. The male can give birth to two babies at a time, and the female can nurse both babies at once. The males are 52cm in height in males and 59cm in males in females, with a maximum weight of 9kg in males. The females are 52 cm to 68 cm in females and recorded in males is 6 kg in females is 9kg and maximum weight in females is 6kg . The males can reach a height of 52cm and a weight of 6kg in males, while females reach a maximum height of 59 cm. The female can hold a baby in her mouth for up to two hours.