Eastern Wallaroo males fighting over a female
Two Eastern Wallaroos fighting over a female
Canon EOS R1 with a Canon RF 100-500mm f/4.5-7.1 L IS USM Zoom [ISO500, 500mm, f/8.0 and 1/1000])
In mid-August, on the way back from Namadgi National Park, I came across a group of Eastern Wallaroos (Osphranter robustus) in a farmer’s field. The wallaroos seem to love this field and I often see them there. On this morning, two males started fighting. It was a stop-start affair but eventually one hopped away and I thought it was over. However, that male didn’t understand the idea of to the winner goes the spoils, because after a little while he hopped over to a female to start sniffing her and grasping her tail. Probably to check to see if she was ready for mating. The other male wasn’t happy and came bounding over. The female hopped away from the two fighters. She watched them once, but basically returned to eating the juicy green grass. One male lost again, but I wasn’t sure which one it was, and this time he hopped away to where he decided that eating grass was better than mating with the female. The other male also ate grass where the fight had been and didn’t bother the female.
Normally, wallaroos are solitary animals but I think the field is a good source of food for them so there is a loose group that often visits from the neighbouring high ground. There was a smaller wallaroo around the female, possibly a joey, and the joey’s father might have been protecting the female from interference while she was still caring for a joey. Wallaroos bond for mating, and the male will defend the female while there is a joey in the pouch, but when it is permanently out the bond will weaken and he will stop defending her. Normally, there is a dominant male who mates with multiple females, and that could have been another explanation for the fighting that occurred. The dominant male might have been seeing off a challenger for one of his females. Females can mate at any time, and sometimes have three joeys on the go - one in the uterus, one in the pouch, and one still taking milk but out of the pouch.
Update, after posting this, a friend on Instagram, who lives down that way, said that the farmer who owns that field, loves wallaroos, and actually cultivates that field especially for wallaroos to eat in it. Well done that farmer, and thank you. When I am heading to Namadgi National Park, I often look at the wallaroos in that field and I am so that glad that the farmer has done what they have done.
