Endangered Parma Wallaby Joey "Chicken" Rescued and-Hand Raised

After being thrown from his mother's pouch, Chicken was rescued and is thriving in the care of Aussie Ark's Conservation Ark Ranger, Tilly Morrison

Conservation organisation Aussie Ark is thrilled to introduce the newest baby to be cared for in its famous breeding and rewilding family; an adorable seven-month-old male Parma Wallaby joey called Chicken.

Chicken is seven months old and was born in the Barrington Tops Wildlife Sanctuary to a ‘wild’ mother. For an unknown reason, Chicken was thrown from his mother’s pouch and left cold and alone in the autumn bush. Thankfully team members heard him calling and rescued him. It was touch and go for a while, but the teeny youngster survived the first critical nights and was transferred off the Barrington Tops to be cared for by surrogate ‘mother’ Conservation Ark Ranger Tilly Morisson located on the Central Coast of NSW.

This is the very first time Ms Morisson has hand-raised a macropod, and she is proud to call herself ‘Macropod Mumma’!

In the wild, Chicken would be mostly in pouch and is entirely reliant on milk. Ms Morisson needs to feed Chicken a special macropod milk mix four times a day, with an additional two feeds of water. The joey must also be assisted with toileting, and Ms Morisson needs to help him hit all his wallaby milestones including sampling solid food, exploring the world and building up muscle strength, and maturing into an independent wallaby.

It’s a huge responsibility for Ms Morisson and has presented some unexpected challenges.

“Chicken is a big sook!” Ms Morisson said. “And he likes to suck on his toe! He’s doing this for comfort, the same as a baby sucks a finger. But it can create problems, so I’ve had to give him a dummy when he’s not drinking milk, and he loves it. It puts him straight to sleep.”

Chicken will be with Ms Morisson for another two or three months until he is weaned and independent. He will then return to the place of his birth at the Ark, to start life with other Parma Wallabies in Aussie Ark’s Species Recovery Unit. It’s hoped he will one day sire his own joeys and help save his species from extinction.

The Parma Wallaby was once widespread along Australia’s eastern seaboard but was tragically decimated by feral predators. It was thought extinct until rediscovered in the 1960’s, serendipitously by Eric Worrell who was the former owner of the Australian Reptile Park, Aussie Ark’s sister organisation. One of the species’ last strongholds is the Gosford area of NSW’s Central Coast, the location of the Park. So the species is ‘close to the heart’ of the sister organisations, and Aussie Ark’s insurance population is a major player helping conserve this iconic little macropod from extinction.

Chicken’s journey from rescue to rehabilitation to ultimate release is a nationally significant example of Aussie’s Ark specialist work breeding and rewilding some of Australia’s most iconic and endangered species.