An adorable baby bilby has emerged from its mother’s pouch in the Bilby Burrow at the Ipswich Nature Centre.
Ipswich will be given the chance to help name the new bilby, which is a boy.
“Visitors may not be able to come in and see him for themselves at the moment, so we thought we could still involve our visitors by giving them the opportunity to name this little one,” senior zoologist Nicole Richards said.
“You can suggest a name for him on the Ipswich City Council’s Facebook page, there will be a special post on Friday, 10 April at 6pm asking for the community to write a name in the comments.”
The bilby was born in January and staff first saw him in the pouch when he was still the size of a jelly bean.
“He has been growing each week and has finally emerged from his mother’s pouch this week,” Ms Richards said.
“He has perfect timing emerging from the pouch right before Easter as we would like to encourage the community to celebrate our native bilby at Easter time.”
The baby is staying close to his mum, Tanami, occasionally venturing off to explore his new surrounds.
He will continue to suckle milk from the pouch until he is fully weaned at around 13 to 15 weeks.
The Ipswich Nature Centre has a world class bilby breeding enclosure. Ms Richards said the successful breeding here in Ipswich bodes well for the endangered species.
The baby bilby is in the foreground and mum Tanami can been seen in the back of the burrow facing the camera
Mum Tanami is doing well
The baby bilby enjoys spending time with mum or in the burrow
“Through Save the Bilby Fund, the Queensland Government, and the National Recovery Plan for the species, plans are in place for bilbies to be released into Currawinya National Park and the Australian Wildlife Conservancy Mt Gibson,” she said.
“The Ipswich Nature Centre has bred bilbies successfully in the past, with a male born in 2018 and female triplets born in 2017.
“Each of these girls was relocated from the Ipswich Nature Centre to other facilities and one was released at the Australian Wildlife Conservancy Mt Gibson.”
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I would like to suggest the name Tohno for the Baby Bilby