Talk:Kangaroo

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[edit] Origin of the name

The following which was contained in this article is a myth, albeit a very popular one:

The name kangaroo originates from the native Australian for "I don't understand".

See http://www.dictionary.com/cgi-bin/dict.pl?term=kangaroo

Also, there's no such thing as "native Australian". There are over 200 distinct Australian aboriginal languages. -- SJK

But now it doesn't make sense: if there is a belief that kangaroo MEANS 'I don't have a clue' then that is what it does mean, at least to the believers. It needs to be rewritten.

Here's a page that states the myth as fact if you want to replace that "Citation Needed": http://www.bmwworld.com/driving/kangaroo.htm 202.14.81.50 03:51, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for supplying the reference, which has now replaced the previous "Citation Needed" comment. Figaro 11:34, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


bla

[edit] Bipeds

They are mentioned as bipeds in that acticle, but is that fair? Do they walk, or just hop? and how much is the tail involved in keeping them from tipping over, i.e., do the go thru the balancing act that other bipeds do when standing or moving? --Jerzy 21:55, 2004 Feb 20 (UTC)

They have two distinct gaits. The first is hopping - this they use when they're at speed. Both feet hit the ground simultaneously and they bounce forward a few metres, bringing their feet forward while they're in the air for the next bounce. There's a kind of walk I've seen wallabies do, alternating between forefeet and tail and hindlegs for propulsion. 129.94.6.28

[edit] Useful References

Some useful references dealing with the conflict between humans and kangaroos including farming and car accidents. I would still like to see these areas covered in more depth in the article. Martyman 22:07, 2 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Feral cats posing a threat to kangaroos? I'd really want to see some evidence for this. Indeed, I'm also inclined to doubt that foxes are a threat — a fox is a lot smaller than a roo, after all. Tannin 09:28, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Boxing for exercise is a fact?

Hi, ZayZayEM, I see you have put back, in the name of restoring facts, the reference to kangaroos boxing "for exercise". I had removed it because I thought it a weird claim that would distract readers' attention away from the good and interesting information in the paragraph. If you say the boxing is exercise, and is good for them, I've no reason to doubt it, but "for exercise" imputes a very humanlike motive — a motive only a couple of centuries old in humans — to an animal. Also, if they had that motive, how could we ever know it? I removed it on general epistemological principles and because it was humanizing an animal, not because I know about kangaroos. If they sometimes box for no obvious reason of defence or dominance, perhaps "in play" would be appropriate?--Bishonen 11:55, 3 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I guess "play" would be acceptable for me. The point is that they seem to just do it, like other animals (bears, tigers, jackals etc.) wrastle with one another in a non-malicious manner.
Fighting is a way of life 
For the big male, however, combat is regular exercise, and a means of maintaining social order. In roaming mobs, sometimes numbering scores, the "old man" enforces his domination by cuffing the others with his forepaws. In a manner much like boxing younger males spar playfully among themselves – and fight fiercely when the time comes to win mates
The above is from my Underhill reference (a Reader's Digest book on Dangerous Australian animals).--ZayZayEM 01:29, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)
Please see what you think of the sentence now, change back if you don't like it. (Not sure I like it.) I wasn't too happy with the chicken metaphor of "pecking order", either, it sounds a little unexpected used about a non-bird animal (as opposed to the normal metaphorical use about humans).--Bishonen 02:07, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Disneyworld pics

Are those creatures pictured at Disneyland actually kangaroos? They look very small. Tannin 14:00, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

They could very well be infantile. →Raul654 17:09, Feb 4, 2005 (UTC)
They may be Western Greys (according to the article smallest), and likely young and/or female; but then again they may be wallabies. I'll try and get a knowledgable friend to take a squizz. Raul, was it Calif. or Flor. park?--ZayZayEM 01:32, 5 Feb 2005 (UTC)
Disneyworld (Florida). →Raul654 02:05, Feb 5, 2005 (UTC)
Shouldn't the caption read "Disneyworld" then?--ZayZayEM 13:36, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Roos and people

I have elaborated a bit on the politics of the roo meat industry. I think this article needs some reference to the Skippy series, which did a lot to foster anthropomorphic fondness for roos and reluctance to eat them. Adam 10:48, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Pouch

Kangaroo article links to pouch, which is a redirect to Ileo-anal pouch. Is this intentional? --romanm (talk) 07:00, 3 August 2005 (UTC)

pouch has been changed to be a disambiguation page. Schutz 14:44, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Simple Kangaroo

Does anyone know why someone posted simple:Kangaroo this into the main article on 1st of January 2006?

[edit] eminent domain addition

I initially reverted and then re-added the recent addition of the eminent domain info. Does anyone know of this at all? I am not sure if it is BS or not, google doesn't seem to help. --Martyman-(talk) 02:19, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

The same addition was made to eminent domain. I am leaning twords removing it unless someone knows something about it. Are there such things as "kangaroo reserves" in Australia? --Martyman-(talk) 02:26, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
I decided to revert it, please feel free to re-add it if anyone thinks it is actually real. --Martyman-(talk) 02:29, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] missing Picture

Theres alot of nice pictures in the article, but they are all Grey's does anyone have any pictures of Reds That would be suitable. If we can get some maybe consideration should be given to culling some of the Grey Pictures from the article Gnangarra 00:29, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Kangaroo meat in Germany

"Kangaroo meat has been quite successful on the European market, particularly in Germany." I am a bit surprised to read this as I am German and have never seen any Kangaroo meat in Germany, neither in the supermarket nor in the restaurant.

I once had a Kangaroo burger at the music festival "Rock in den Ruinen" in Dortmund. And we have an Australian pub here in Dortmund which sells at least one meal including Kangaroo meat. But I never noticed any popularity of Kangaroo meat. --Pohli

[edit] Kangaroo Culling

This sentence is giving me problems:

This is the reason why wildlife activists claim that kangaroos are not as well protected a species as they should be.

I can't work out from the text what reason the sentence is referring to. Is it that it is protected by state & territory authories (as opposed to federal)? Or that some high-number species are not protected? Or something else?

Additionally, surely not all wildlife activists have this as the reason. Regards, Ashmoo 01:15, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

"All species of macropod are protected from hunting by state and territory legislation, except for a small number of the large-sized species which exist in high numbers and for which commercial harvesting is permitted under approved management programs."
The statement from an Australian gov't web site clearly indicates large-sized species that exist in greater numbers such as the Kangaroo are not protected from hunting. Sorry for the confusion. I am not a wildlife activist. When I stumbled upon this website "Save the Kangaroo" and saw how lucrative the business of selling kangaroo meat has become, I went looking for a reliable source of data and I think I found it. Personally, I'd rather go moose hunting in Finland. ,,,,,Ariele 15:40, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Why? Is that because the moose isn't cute, furry and hops around the bush? Also, I think you'll find that the meat trade is hardly as damaging to populations as climatic fluctuations. Having lived and worked in the bush a lot, I've seen drought years where there are so many starving kangaroos eating off your lawn that they starve to death in front of your eyes and you have to shoot them from pity. And I've seen wet years where you can't fnd a trace of them and your lawn grows two feet high...until the rain ends and they come in t die on your lawn by the bucketload again. Rolinator 07:56, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Forrester Kangaroos and Prehistoric Kangaroos

Why Forrester kangaroos? I don't know if these kangaroos are indeed Eastern Greys. Can a roo expert please explain? Are these a sub-specie of the Eastern Grey? According to the Australian gov't, there were once 53 species [of Macropods ... ooops], six of which have now become extinct.

Plus, should someone include something about pre-historic kangaroos too; especially the story about the shrinking kangaroos since prehistoric times. ,,,,,Ariele 15:26, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

The article as it is written is about the Macropods specifically called Kangaroos (as in eastern/western greys and red kangaroos). The article on the family of Macropodidae is seperate and includes all the Walabees etc. I see no harm in mentioning a little on prehistoric kangaroos in this article although the information would probably be best suited to the Macropodidae article as it doesn't relate solely to kanagroos as defined in this article. The only other solution I can see would be to merge this article and Macropodidae and then deal with all other species and the evolution and history of them. --Martyman-(talk) 22:19, 14 February 2006 (UTC)
Who me? You're the Roo expert - not me. I can probably edit a little in the Macropodidae article and then add a sentence about the shrinking kangaroos here in this article if that's okay with you?,,,,,Ariele 01:22, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
I am no Kangaroo expert either. I was just offering an opinion on how this info could be included (very helpful I know ;-) ). I was also trying to clear up the question people keep asking about there being only 3 species, when such and such a reference says there are X species. By no means take my suggestions to be anything but suggestions. Feel free to make any changes you feel would help the article, and I do agree that some info on the kangaroo like megafauna would be great to include. --Martyman-(talk) 01:30, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Thanks. Your opinions are helpful. The article megafauna which you introduced here is very informative. This is good.,,,,,Ariele 01:49, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Life expectancy

At the end to of the Physical Description section it says the he average life span of a kangaroo is around 9 years. A few sentences later it is stated that the life expectancy of a kangaroo is about 18 years. Clearly one of them is wrong.

A quick Google found figures from 7 to 28 years, just to confuse matters. Some of the variation seems to be down to longer lives in captivity than in the wild. Perhaps it also varies between species? Markyour words 17:59, 4 March 2006 (UTC)
To make a start on clearing this up, I've removed the mention from the diet section, and changed the one in the physical description section to:
The average life expectancy of a kangaroo is about 9-18 years, with some living until their about 28.
9 years is a very wide range though, so it could do with refining a bit. If the 28 years is in captivity (which seems likely as most animals live longer in captivity than in the wild) then this should be mentioned. Thryduulf 00:14, 9 March 2006 (UTC)


I'm having trouble believing that kangaroos have a life expectancy of 9 years. I have an article hear that states that 60% of juveniles won't survive to the end of their second year. That means that those surviving animals must live ~20 years for the species mean life expectancy to be 9 years.

I think someone has confused life expectancy with life span. 9 years seems like a reasonable life span for a roo, but 9 years is an extremely high life expectancy for any wild mammal and an adult lifespan of 20 years is extremely high for a mammal of this size.

[edit] Car Accidents

It says that theyll most likely die when hit by a car, although as far as I know it is common for a car to be totalled but a kangaroo to survive and hop away, alive. I've no sources to back this up yet there are no sources to inidicate otherwise.

I'm happy with the current version, I spent 2 years driving trucks Perth - Darwin return , Perth - Adelaide return. In that time I saw a lot of car vs Roo accidents and where the car was undriveable(totalled) the roo didn't survive either. Gnangarra 12:35, 10 March 2006 (UTC)
In my experience, roos rarely survive. Though it is not universally fatal to them. In most high-clearance 4WDs, it is possible (and its happened to me) that you drive over the top and the roo rattles trough underneath and hops away. But with most direct hits, it is a fatality. As for the cars, it is often damaging, but usually only fatl for the vehicle's operability if the radiator is punched out. Insurance wise, its better to lose the radiator than a headlight. But it depends on the driver whether they centre-punch or clip skip with the lights. Either way its safer just to brake hard and straight and don't swerve. Rolinator 07:51, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] energy storage

Kangaroos do not have a "unique" ability to store strain, or potential, energy in their tendons. This fancy terminology is just a way to say that tendons work like springs: stretch them out and then they go back - like a pogo stick. All animals with compliant tendons store energy in their tendons. For example, it has been demonstrated that humans store a large percentage of their mechanical energy during gait in the Plantar Facias (the tendon that runs along the sole of the foot) and Achilles tendons. While human physiology has not developed like the Kangaroo's and while we do not store quite the same percentage of our energy in our tendons, we certainly maximize what our tendons can store. In closing, there is no reason to say that other animals do not take advatage of energy storage. Darwin would probably argue that any organism that did not take advantage of an energy returning mechanism built into it's frame would be weeded out quite quickly! Good day. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.180.184.72 (talk • contribs) .

[edit] carnivorous kangaroos

Does anyone know anything about the prehistoric carnivorous kangaroos? Bibliomaniac15 23:04, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Horrible paragraph

"Another horrifying responsibility of a motorist is to finish off the wounded animal. A broken hind leg, for example, spells prolonged and painful death for the creature (much as it does for a horse). Shooting or a swift smashing of the head by a hammer or a rock is required by the humane custom."

I really don't want to be recommending bashing a kangaroos head in, or even shooting them, to the readers. Seriously, hitting it in the head with a rock would not kill it instantly, it would just cause it more pain. This seems to be in line with hitting Cane Toads with golf clubs. It is not our responsibility to tell people how to humanely deal with animals, the RSPCA do that, and I am sure they would be disgusted with this section. --liquidGhoul 00:44, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

As I felt exactly the same about the paragraph and its 'instructions' as you do, I have now deleted it - and replaced the 'instructions' with a comment that a veterinary surgeon or the RSPCA should be contacted when a kangaroo is injured (including severely injured kangaroos), for information about what to do. I made the comment immediately following the information about caring for joey kangaroos whose mothers have been killed in collisions. Figaro 04:35, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Amount of pictures

Is it just me or does there seem to be too many kangaroo pics in the article? I mean, there are two of one jumping, plus several more. It's just not necessary to illustrate the point. — JeremyTalk 11:41, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

I have cleaned up the images. I used this in motion photo because I like how dramatic it was. You can switch if you want. I also removed the photo of a release into Kakadu. The caption says that is a wallaby, which is not within the scope of this article. We also didn't need two warning signs. This article is a mess, it needs some TLC. --liquidGhoul 12:16, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Facts from QI on BBC

The BBC programme QI has recently stated that:

  • kangaroos cannot turn corners while 'hopping', they actually have to stop and turn around
  • kangaroos cannot exhale gas (fart)

Any citations needed or found? --rjcuk 08:50, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Repeated vandalism by a non-registered user

Would it be possible, please, to 'sprotect' this article, following the spate of continuing vandalism to the page.

Otherwise, would it please be possible to block a user who has been deliberably abusing his/her editing rights as a non-registered user, to continually vandalise (presumably by reverting) the "Kangaroo" page (six times so far) with the same moronic message — using four different computers, under the IP numbers of:

  • 68.182.219.198 — Three reverts to "Kangaroo" article - so far. Vandalism, on this IP number, occurred on October 8, 2006.
(vandalism, by this IP number to other Wikipedia articles, included Louis Cyr, John A Macdonald and Charles de Gaulle).
  • 68.182.219.95 — One revert to "Kangaroo" article - so far. Vandalism, on this IP number, occurred on October 8, 2006.
  • 68.182.222.92 — One revert "Kangaroo" article - so far. Vandalism, on this IP number, occurred on October 9, 2006.
  • 68.182.214.63 — One revert "Kangaroo" article - so far. Vandalism, on this IP number, occurred on October 9, 2006.

Although there are four different IP numbers, it is obvious that the same person is responsible for all the vandalism mentioned above — especially as all four IP numbers begin with the same numbers: (68.192), indicating that the computers are all at the same address, and, therefore, that all of the vandalism originated at the same address.

I am aware that it is difficult to block an IP number, because the computers are shared by various people, but this non-register's amusement, at continually vandalising with the same moronic message, is beyond a joke (and it is something which the non-registered user obviously intends to continue ad nauseum). Trying to reverse his rubbish is irksome and time-wasting to users who are trying to make Wikipedia a respected encyclopedia. Figaro 01:37, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

A user block seems best for this - you need to report this at WP:AIV. I could in theory do it, but it looks like a range black might be needed and I don't understand them! Thryduulf 02:34, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Unfortunately, I don't understand them, either.
I notice that the vandal has struck again - this time under the IP number 68.182.8.127. The vandal also struck the John A Macdonald page again. The edits which the vandal made to the Louis Cyr and John A Macdonald pages included comment on the nonsense which the vandal is attributing to the Kangaroo, as well as links to the Kangaroo article.
As I mentioned before, all the vandalism is originating from the same address, and it is also obvious that the same editor is responsible — also it is obvious that the vandal is of the mistaken opinion that his/her tedious, moronic and unfunny edits are very amusing.
As all of the edits which this particular non-registered user has made to articles is vandalism, it is obvious that he/she is only interested in vandalising Wikipedia articles — not adding information to them. Figaro 10:45, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Word origin citation

One place that mentions the word origin myth as untrue is The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000. at http://www.bartleby.com/61/3/K0010300.html. --SamuliK 13:45, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

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