Lawnmower update

I’ve been accused of not posting enough cuteness, so be prepared for a picspam. (And don’t worry, there’s a happy ending)

Rufus was first seen in daylight (wallabies are nocturnal) in Dec 2012. I mowed the lawn the week he appeared. I didn’t mow again until October 2013. (I don’t usually get a fortnight off, let alone months).  I didn’t mow much though, Rufus was here at least every week if not more often.

In January this year, I had bed and breakfast guests and somehow he managed to show up, irregularly, but at least once for each guest’s stay. On Australia Day weekend I had a BBQ and we laughed as one of the guests had to come in the long way round because Rufus appeared to be guarding the front steps. And that was the last time I saw him. The neighbour who often saw him coming across her lawn asked me a couple of weeks later if I’d seen him. No, not even the usual piles of poop that showed he was around at night if not during the day. There was a dead wallaby on the side of the oval just down the street but the council took it before I could look closer.

Two months went by and I started to plan the things I could plant in the gardens that wouldn’t get chewed before they could grow. I started to plan gardens that didn’t include cages to lock the vegetables in.  And then on April 7th I opened the blinds to see this:

 

(That’s the view between the monitors from the study.) He’s sitting in his buffet – the garden bed I had dreams of planting out again. He wasn’t too impressed at my attempts to weed it; he kept looking at the empty spots and glaring at me.

He’s been back twice since then. Not often enough to keep an Autumn lawn under control unfortunately.

Now, a lot of people up the hill (backing onto the reserve) put out vegetable scraps etc for the wallabies at dusk. I’m the only person I’ve heard of who gets to enjoy them in daylight (Yes, on farms you see them across the paddocks, but I’m in suburbia!).

He apparently likes to get good reception – one visit he spent a lot of time tucked up close to the house and the temporary aerial stand.

This morning I went out to hang the washing and realised I was being watched.

Then he came up and sat below the bedroom window so I managed to get a few photos.

Relax, that’s his TAIL.

He does a good rabbit impression too.

In the afternoon I took him a handful of pellets, because I still have some from when he broke his foot. It has healed well. Despite still looking quite swollen, he doesn’t favour it at all and moves around very naturally. Quite a change from the way it hung limply, obviously both bones broken through.

Despite the dire predictions of the wildlife park that if I fed him while he was injured he would become dependent upon the food, he hasn’t, but he has remembered that when I toss things on the lawn he doesn’t have to run far away. In fact he let me get the closest ever; I even walked behind the chair and sat on the lawn on the other side of the clothes line to take some more photos.

Check out those claws.

Of course there is one concern. When I got back at dusk I glanced out the window to see this.

He’s standing below the study window staring up. He stayed there until it was too dark to see him. I think I’m being stalked… for pellets.

If you like Rufus please leave a comment here, and share this post. I could do with the extra hits 🙂