Devil Day

Blimey, it was cold last night. It must have been near freezing, and I woke up very stiff from sleeping scrunched up. But a good hot shower and the sun, once it came out, fixed that.

A currawong, a big black beaky thing with piercing yellow eyes, tried nicking some of our gear as we were putting it into bags. As audacious at the possums, but not as cute. But we were ready for him, and he got nothing.

When we had packed up this morning, headed out for the Tassie devils sanctuary, Devils@Cradle, just up the road. A cancer that has appeared within the devil community in recent years, leading to facial tumours and death, but nobody knows why. And unfortunately, its has already spread to most of the State. So the idea is to study the condition, find a way to control and eventually fix it, breed disease free devils to return to the wild, and prevent the species from becoming extinct. That of course has already happened to thylacines, or Tasmanian Tigers to the rest of us, although there have been apparent but unconfirmed spots of them from time to time.

Devils used to be common on mainland Australia too, having walked from what is now South America to Australia in Gondwana times. But their extinction happened years ago, possibly because of dingoes.

Anyway, it was an excellent place and we spent a good while there, finding out stuff about the little buggers, which are every bit as wild and ferocious as we hoped they would be. 

Some devilish facts:

• they are carnivourous marsupials, meaning they eat meat and carry babies in their pouches

* They are solitary and will fight other devils, even siblings or  

   parents

• they give birth to between 20-40 babies each time, but as there are only four nipples in the pouch, only the first four get to second base

* four newborn babies will fit on a 10c (10p) coin

* devil gestation is only 3 weeks

* devils live for just 5 years, sometimes 6 in captivity

• devils diet consists of 80% carrion and they will eat any old dead meat, but like pademelon in particular

• Each time they mate, the devils fight and the males get scratched and cut by the females. When their fur grows back, it grows back white, so that those who fancy themselves as stallions, are often quite spotted with white

• Devils (both male and female) have a white band, either on their rumps or chest. This is nothing to do with mating but is a marking that acts as a type of fingerprint so that they can recognise each other.

Also in the sanctury were a few quolls, native cats, really pretty little things, a bit like pine martens or polecats. They are a bit more social than devils, but eat fresh meat mostly, catching small birds and animals.

On the way back down the mountain, we stopped off at a Tasmanian Tiger exhibition. These were hunted to extinction relativey recently, bounties being paid to anybody killing one. Its a really sad story too as the Tigers were blamed for sheep deaths, but the raeltity was that kills were mostly down to dogs. However, because people thought of the Tasmanian tiger as something dangerous and akin to ‘real' tigers the poor animals were doomed. The last one, Benjamin,  died in Hobart zoo in 1936  from exposure as it was given no external shelter in captivity. And it was only after Benjamin’s  death ( it had been in the zoo for something like 12 years) they discovered that it was in fact female and not male. So much for animal care.

This exhibition was in a complex, and by luck in the same complex, a photo exhibition was in full swing. So for 3.00 AUD we saw 10 rooms of some stunning photos of Tasmanian nature and wildlife, and ate a great lunch.

The ride down from Cradle mountain was wonderful, descending the 78 kms of twisty road, passing little communities to which people had given a little bit of colour.

As usual, there was very little interference from traffic, even when we reached Forth and the coast. 

After a brief stop there, we rode onto Ulverston for Gordon to get some sinus medicine. Whilst we waited for him, a chap  (Richard) started chatting to us as we sat on the bikes. 

He was originally from Newcastle, UK, but had lived in Tassie for 40 years and was a fellow biker, as was his wife. So we had a good old jaw with him about bikes, Tasmania and life in general. Nice chap, and it was a shame to leave him but we needed to get further along the coast before nightfall.

We did stop briefly in a place just down the road - a place called Penguin; it would have been a travesty not to have done. Penguin, Tasmania. What a great place to come from!

It was named after the Fairy penguins which frequent the sea nearby and was only set up as a town in the early 1900s. The business signs are great though - Penguin Barbers, Penguin Butchers, Penguin Grocers, and Penguin Library. Funny. Makes you wonder what the staff look like.

We’ve stopped for the night in Burnie, with a view over the Ocean; a great end to another great day.