Musky Rat Kangaroo

There are several animals of the Kangaroo family referred to as Rat-kangaroos.  This is sometimes written as Rat Kangaroo.  Note that in English, when an animal’s name is made up of two different types of animal, the second one is the type of animal while the first is what it looked like to whoever named it; so a Rat-kangaroo is a type of Kangaroo while a Kangaroo-rat is a type of Rat.

Most Kangaroos have much bigger back legs than their front ones, but the Musky Rat-kangaroo has all four legs of similar length.  They do not tend to hop as much as the larger Kangaroos.

The Musky Rat-kangaroo, Hypsiprymnodon moschatus, is the only surviving species of the family Hypsiprymnodontidae.  It is the smallest of the Macropods (Loosely,the Macropods are the Kangaroo group of animals.)  The maximum weight of the Musky Rat-kangaroo is about one and a half pounds (three quarters of a Kilogram) while the average is about a pound (Half a Kilogram.)

Habitat

This animal lives in the tropical rainforests of North Queensland. It can be seen during the day in the Crater Lakes National Park.  Your best chance of seeing wild ones is to go on some of the walking trails round Lake Eacham, and keep your eyes open.

At night you may be lucky enough to see Lumholtz’s Tree Kangaroos.

Food

This animal mainly eats fruit such as Figs, Lilly-pillies, Quandongs, Walnuts and the fruit of vines.  They also eat soft coated seeds, tubers and other roots as well as fungus. 

Their diet is generally richer than that of the larger Kangaroos, and their simpler digestive system would be unable to get enough nutrients from the high roughage food of many of their relatives.

Threats

The Musky Rat-kangaroo is threatened by the destruction and fragmentation of its habitat. Because their rainforests are being split up into separate small areas by