Animal Diaries Archive

Andi

18 January 2008

For the proud surrogate parents out there, here is an update on our beautiful girl, Andi, who is sponsored by zoo supporters as part of our Adopt an Animal program.

5yr old Andi is a very sweet and placid koala, but also has a reputation as being a bit of a cheeky girl! Her favourite pastime is teaching her keepers the art of patience. Whenever we attempt to get her down from the tree, she insists on taking the longest time possible. She will stop and stretch out her bottom and have a leisurely scratch of her back legs on the way down, then let her legs hang down and do a big stretch. Following a yawn, and maybe another scratch she will finally make her way down to a tree fork low enough to where we can reach her. So five minutes later... and we are finally ready to head off to our photo session. But taking this time to prepare is obviously important for a supermodel koala such as Andi, as she behaves perfectly for the cameras, displaying her massive fluffy ears and gorgeous face proudly for her photos! Australia Zoo is increasing their koala colony through a fantastic breeding program at the Zoo to facilitate greater education of this important species. If you would like to sponsor and animal (or conservation project), go to the Adopt an Animal section on the Australia Zoo Web site, and you too can play a part in helping global animal conservation.