If you’re not used to seeing them, kangaroos are challenging beasts to get your head round. I mean, what on earth is that creature with the rodent-like head, wet snout, sultry eyelashes and cute whiskers aplenty, but also with the bodybuilder’s shoulders and the legs that look as powerful as the prongs of a forklift truck? Who designed this thing – and why did they make them 6 feet tall?
Kangaroos are a lot to take in. At first glance, they look like a lot of fascinating, even brilliant evolutionary ideas…and yet the victim of a lack of understanding of how to fit them all together.
But take ye not this oddly-fitted-together marsupial for granted. There are good reasons why Australians feel so inspired by them that they’ve put them on the country’s coat of arms and on some of its currency, and kangaroos regularly feature in the marketing materials of Australian businesses, like the white stylized ‘roo at the centre of the Qantas Airlines logo. It’s not just that total kangaroos across all species outnumber humans in Australia (34 million to 27 million, respectively) – there’s a respect for these creatures that goes much deeper than sheer numbers.
We should respect them too. They may look adorable enough to make it into a Disney or Pixar movie – but these are Nature’s survivors, incredibly resilient, superbly adapted and built to take on anything and anyone (although they generally don’t do that, because they’re herbivores). There’s much here to be in awe of.
For starters: how fast can you run? If you were at the peak of your fitness after months of training – the very best physical shape of your life – and then you launched yourself into a 100-metre sprint that burned every calorie of energy you have available, you’d probably reach a speed of 25 or maybe 30 kilometres per hour. If you turned out to be the fastest person on the planet, you’d surpass Usain Bolt’s 2009 world record of 44.7 km/h.
Kangaroos don’t run, of course – they hop, in that languid lolloping motion that lowers your blood pressure just to see it (and you’ll never see them move any other way, because they can’t walk or go backwards). Nothing looks hurried about a kangaroo at full hop. But this is deceptive, because every one of those leaps eats up 9 metres of ground, ten of our steps on average, powering it along at anything up to 70 km/h – and so efficiently that they can keep above 50 km/h for hours on end.
Then there’s the teeth. Kangaroos mostly eat grass, which is rich in abrasive silica and can play havoc with the surfaces of teeth. Kangaroos get round this using the neat trick of making new teeth to replace the old ones (just imagine if humans could do the same!). Their molar teeth move forward in their jaws like a conveyor belt, replacing old & worn ones that fall out of their jaws. This process lasts until old age – and this allows scientists to date kangaroos with great accuracy.
Then there are the shoulders. Have you ever seen a kangaroo’s shoulders? They’re…memorable. A few years ago, a TikTok user shared footage of a kangaroo with the shredded upper body of Hugh Jackman, and it quickly went viral. As a commenter explained: “It’s older male kangaroos that get jacked arms. As they get older it becomes more difficult for them to hop, thus they support their body weight with their arms while trotting and their motion are kinda like push-ups, which results in massive arm muscles.”
Thankfully, while kangaroos can be aggressive to each other, sparring and fighting for a place in their social hierarchy, usually while balancing on their immensely strong tails, they’re generally docile towards human beings. That said, you do not mess with a kangaroo, either on its own or in a mob (that’s the collective noun for them). The man who rescued his dog from a kangaroo and achieved worldwide fame for deterring it with a punch to the chops was taking a huge risk – its feet come with long claws, so one kick from those powerful legs can do terrible damage. They also have specially toughened skin – armour, essentially – on their chest and abdomen, and because of their long tail, they’re exceptional swimmers and use water to drown attackers. A kangaroo would make a good friend and a truly formidable enemy.
But nothing sums up the thrilling weirdness of kangaroos like the way they have babies.
When a kangaroo is born, it’s about the size of a grape or a jelly bean – and it makes its way through its mothers fur to her pouch, a pocket-like fold of skin covering her teats (here’s a photo of a newborn in its pouch). After 4 months of growth, the baby kangaroo (joey) begins to make exploratory forays away from its mother, returning to the pouch to rest – and after 10 months, it leaves it completely to make its way in the outside world.
But in essence, a kangaroo’s pregnancy lasts just 28 days – which can mean a queue can develop, because a mother only has one pouch. Yet again, kangaroos have developed a way around this: they put their embryos in suspended animation, extending gestation for up to 11 months. It’s called embryonic diapause – and it’s a huge evolutionary advantage for times of food scarcity, perfectly suited for the environmental challenges of a life in the driest continent on Earth.
What an awe-inspiring creature.
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