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Wallabes roaming free in East Anglia

A

Anonymous

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I live in a small village in Cambridgeshire called Duxford. You may have heard of it as it is home to an air museam. Very exciting indeed, as I'm sure you can imagine. Anyway, at the time of the incident I was about 6, my sister was 8 and her friend was 9. We were all on our daily walk to school just a few minutes away, when across the road we saw something hop past. It was obscured by some shrubs, but then it hopped right back into view. It was a wallabe! We all saw it, as clear as anything! We ran back into the house to tell my friends mother, but by the time we came outside it was gone :( My parents still think me and my sister made it up-and that was over 10 years ago!
 
I'd heard years ago that Wallabies had started to colonise the North Yorkshire moors.
 
Next time I'm in the UK, we should organise a Wallaby spotting expedition. It was one of the things I regret not getting to last time.
 
Yes, in the previous discussion, Brian Elwood says he saw the Derbyshire wallabies.
They were actually quite tame when I met them.
I got within about 10 ft. before the first one I came across took flight, even then it was only hopping leisurely away (I was sprinting, but could not get near).
I saw about 3 or four together that day.
This was on moorland near Ludd's Church, Gradbach, in the Peak District.

They had apparently escaped/been released during the war, and had been surviving happily since on the moors. They even survived an inmpropmtu cull by local youths with crossbows.

A few years ago, I heard they had died out, which was sad.
Does anyone know if this is true ?

Does anyone know of Porcupine or Capybara wild in Britain ?
 
anome said:
Next time I'm in the UK, we should organise a Wallaby spotting expedition. It was one of the things I regret not getting to last time.
Click to expand...
:blah:
 
joester said:
Yes, in the previous discussion, Brian Elwood says he saw the Derbyshire wallabies.
They were actually quite tame when I met them.

A few years ago, I heard they had died out, which was sad.
Does anyone know if this is true ?
Click to expand...

I'm cross posting here (mods merge or destroy as you will!) but on the UK Marsupial's thread I'd posted my experience with the Peak District colony too.

A few years back, an article in a Midland's Sunday paper said that they had died out due to bad winters, poor breeding stock etc., but I have been told by friends since that there are a very tiny number left, compared to the size of previous colonies. Whether this is correct I'm not 100%, but I hope they are still there, it's a surreal moment seeing wild wallabies in the UK.
 
There may well be wallabies in the East Anglia region. I recall my stepdad telling me once that he used to see quite a few of them around the Thetford area, sometimes in groups.

I think the story is that a zoo somewhere around here closed down (possibly in the 70s), and a lot of the animals were to be put down. Apparently some of the less dangerous animals, including wallabies, were released into the wild by keepers who didn't want to see them killed.

Quite a few wallabies used to be seen around Thetford, but I've not heard of any new sightings since I moved to Norfolk (about 10 years ago). Duxford isn't too far from Thetford, I think it would be possible for some wallabies to have established some sort of breeding population (albeit a small one), and they wouldn't have too hard a time hiding in Thetford forest.

Of course, this is entirely speculation, based on my vague memory of a conversation from several years ago, so don't place too much faith in it. The whole zoo scenario sounds a bit fantastic to me, but I'll find out some more details next time I see my stepdad and post again. I'll also nose around and see if I can find out if there were any zoos in the area that closed down around the specified time as well.
 
Thanks for the info, slayer :) There's a zoo about 10 miles away in Linton, so I guess it's fairly plausable that it came from there. But please keep me informed of any developments :cool:
 
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