Sicarius

Queensland yellow-footed rock-wallaby (Petrogale xanthopus celeris)

  • Media owner Sicarius
  • Date added
I just found out through zoo reports that the Japanese population should belong to this subspecies. Europe/America only has the South Australian population (Petrogale xanthopus xanthopus). That makes this Queensland subspecies far more rare in captivity.
I have never heard of the Japanese population of Yellow-footed rock-wallaby being Petrogale xanthopus celeris.
The Yellow-footed rock-wallaby at Tama Zoological Park came from the HIBIKI ANIMAL WORLD in Kyushu. There are more than 120 yellow-footed rock-wallabies there, and the founder was imported from Australia.
 
I am greatly surprised at this! The subspecies celeris does have a captive population in Australia, but it was formed at a government breeding facility at Charleville (not a zoo) and from which animals have been reintroduced to the wild. Zoo animals in Australia (and hence Europe and North America) are the nominate subspecies xanthopus from South Australia. So Japanese zoo imports being celeris seemed thoroughly unlikely. However, after a bit of searching, I found an article in the IZY (abstract only, on the link below) from the time of the import to Japan which says that 2.4 animals were indeed sent to Japan from the Charleville site.
https://zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1748-1090.1993.tb03537.x
 
Really amazing piece of news. So the Hibiki Animal World holds close on 120 yellow-footed rock walabies? It would be nice if some of toerock wallaby's would be up for integration into the celeris yellow-footed rock wallaby's reintroduction program.

A nice after-thought.
 

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Tama Zoo
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Sicarius
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NIKON CORPORATION NIKON D7100
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Mon, 14 November 2022 4:37 AM
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