Tag Archives: Southern Australia

Today’s highlighted photo features a baby short-beaked echidna known as a “Puggle”.  It likely is the rarest photo of an animal I’ve ever taken in the wild (note: this is not a zoo photo).  Puggles are carried in their mother’s pouches and it’s rare to know the mother is with child unless you’ve closely followed her (in this case by a group of field biologists on Kangaroo Island, using radiotelemetry).

Echidnas, also known as spiny anteaters, are egg-laying mammals (monotremes) found only in Australia and New Guinea.  The female lays a small soft-shelled leathery egg which is deposited into her belly pouch.  The young echidna hatches in about 10 days, the youngster sucking on milk from one of two milk patches (monotremes …

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