National Geographic: Australias Animal Mysteries Page #4

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out termites, its primary food.

Its long, sinuous, sticky tongue can

capture thousands of the insects a day.

With its distinctive bands of white

and its bottlebrush tail,

the numbat is considered by many

to be Australia's most

beautifully marked marsupial.

The majestic Blue Mountains lie

Here, beneath the vivid blue haze

which gave the mountains their name,

areas of pristine wilderness abound.

Nestled in the hills,

an historic estate called Yengo

spreads across 25 acres.

For the past 12 years it

has been a private reserve dedicated

to breeding endangered animals.

He's really heavy, I'll tell you that.

The owner is businessman Peter Pigott,

one of Australia's

foremost conservationists.

With his wife and son,

he is transferring a wombat injured

in a fight to a safer enclosure.

Come here.

Come on.

Nice leg to bite.

Pigott's breeding success with

wombats is considered phenomenal

better than any zoo

and is attributed to his

concern for creating

the most natural setting possible

in a captive environment.

I guess that my first opportune at

doing something very constructive

in the field of conservation was the

rediscovery of a wallaby

that we thought was extinct.

The parma wallaby, a mall kangaroo

only about 14 inches tall,

was abundant until early settlers

destroyed its habitat

and introduced new predators.

Though thought to be extinct,

a small colony was discovered in 1965.

Starting with only 18 animals,

Pigott has increased the population

here to more than 200 in ten years.

A lot of people say to me,

now why should we conserve wildlife?

Why should we be really concerned?

I mean, aren't people more

important than wildlife?

We are all part of the 600 million

years of evolution

and I suppose that one of

the great things

that separates mankind from the animals

is our sense and

appreciation of the esthetics

our love of literature,

our love of art and poetry,

and of nature itself.

I often think that if we lose this we

disregard the world that's around us

and the animals that are here.

We might wake up one morning and

find ourselves on the endangered list.

Her skies ablaze with color,

Australia has been called

"the foremost land of birds".

More than 300 species are

unique to her shores.

One of Australia's most distinctive birds,

the mallee fowl is a prodigious engineer.

To incubate their eggs in a harsh

environment that is generally dry

and subject to sharp temperature changes,

they build mounds up to 15 feet

across and several feet high.

Working together,

male and female have laid down

a bed of wet leaves and twigs.

To seal in the moisture and heat

of the fermenting compost,

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