Monti? That's me!
Agile wallaby Monti gets to know his new kangaroo family.
What an exciting world we live in! Just look out for those pesky and rather spikey stinging nettles. Agile wallaby Monti would certainly prefer to avoid such surprising first contact. Briefly shaking himself down, he is already assessing his next leap…
Every day at lunch time, the young kangaroo hops out of his "replacement pouch", maintained by animal keeper Jens Schnabel, and starts on his exciting voyage of discovery. Monti not only has to take a good sniff around the kangaroo enclosure at Tierpark Berlin, he also has to get right up close and personal with his new family.
The little hopper is so eager with the task in hand, that he timidly reveals himself to all his counterparts. Yet, these animals are true to their name: Using his agility, Monti springs out to greet them all. "That's quite normal," says keeper Schnabel, "just like us humans, they need a little time to get to know their surroundings. Since Monti is now playing with his mates on a daily basis, we are quite happy that he has found his place in the kangaroo group."
Six–seven month-old agile wallaby Monti, is already notching up an impressive 1,460 grams on the scales and measures 30 centimeters. A true success: When mother Mona died and the little one found his "second home" with animal keeper Jens Schnabel, he weighed just 850 grams. In the meantime, he has been putting on around 40 grams a day while eagerly drinking approx. 50 ml of lactose-free milk every three hours. The lactose in regular milk can lead to blindness in kangaroos.
Keeper Schnabel estimates that by the end of the month, Monti will be large and mobile enough to stand on his own two feet and assert himself in the kangaroo pack.
