13 unique kangaroo images: can you help us decide which is best?

The featured image at the top of this story is a magnificent male Eastern-grey kangaroo peering inquisitively out of the bushes. Caution and curiosity are present in its eyes and stance.

Eastern-greys are the tallest of our kangaroos, an embodiment of power and strength. Condensed testosterone emanates from them — you can smell it sometimes.

But with all that “maleness” these guys can be surprisingly timid and will bound off at the slightest hint of movement in their direction. That’s what this fellow is assessing: will I go or stay.

Image: Echidna Walkabout

Where: Western Plains near Melbourne

Tour: Great Ocean Road

This is what wild animals cope with.

One of my guests took this unique image whilst I held an umbrella to protect us from what turned out to be a surprisingly violent and damaging hailstorm.

Although the umbrella came out worse for wear the kangaroos appeared unfazed by the pounding.

How many kangaroos do you see in the image? There are at least two large males (big forearms), a female on her own on the right (petite forearms) and I’ll leave it to you to find the others.

This image not only helps you appreciate how incredibly tough kangaroos are but also how aware they are of their surroundings — they kept a close eye on us even in conditions that must have been extremely painful.

Image: Ann Smith, Echidna Walkabout guest

Where: Western Plains near Melbourne

Tour: Great Ocean Road

This courtship portrait of a male Red kangaroo (left) and female shows the remarkable difference in both size and colour between the genders in the Red kangaroo.

Males are generally a bright rusty colour and the females are usually light grey yet they are the same species! Believe it or not, females are sometimes red and males can be grey.

Mungo National Park is my favourite place to watch kangaroos, it never fails to produce boundless opportunities to see both Red and Western-grey kangaroos. In wet years we sometimes see Eastern-greys!

Unlike Western-greys, Red kangaroos are cautious of humans and will move away fast at the slightest provocation. This pair stayed close to us for about 5 minutes allowing a series of magnificent back-lit photos that we’ve used a number of times.

Image: Michael Williams, “It’s a Wildlife”
(Sadly Wildlife Guide and photographer, Michael Williams, passed away not long after this image was taken. You can see more of his images in this article and elsewhere on our website. Michael kindly donated this and many other great photos to Echidna Walkabout)

Where: Mungo National Park

Tour: Mungo Outback Journey

Joey care for kangaroos means regular pouch cleaning. This marsupial mother is tidying up her young one’s waste and cleaning up her teats (she has 4) …..

You often see female kangaroos with their heads in their pouch, even when there is no obvious young in it. But don’t let that fool you – there may be a tiny joey growing deep inside her pouch.

Notice how curious the joey is! Even at this young age (about 4 months) kangaroos are constantly alert to danger. If you look closely you also see this joey has its hind legs up beside its head! There’s a real mess of legs, arms and body inside that pouch. Check out the next image for more on this….

Image: Janine Duffy, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Western Plains near Melbourne, Victoria

Tour: Great Ocean Road

Kangaroo pouches are the largest of all marsupials and are capable of huge changes in shape….

I’ve seen a female kangaroo with her pouch lying on the ground, like an open drawstring bag, fully distended. She then pulled it back against her belly and it disappeared!

In this photo a joey is climbing back into the pouch assisted by its mother – you can see her hands helping. In a month or two she will force her joey out and lock the opening with a powerful muscle so that the young one can’t get back in.

Marsupials all have pouches, in fact the Latin word for pouch is “marsupium“.

And here’s another Latin link: those huge feet give the kangaroo family its Latin name: Macropus meaning “big foot”.

Image: Janine Duffy, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Western Plains near Melbourne, Victoria

Tour: Maximum Wildlife

Antilopine refers to the shape of this kangaroo’s head which apparently looked like an antelope’s according to the person who named it.

We think Graceful is much better……

If you live in temperate southern Australia you won’t see this kangaroo. They are a macropod of the monsoon tropics that can cope with climate extremes that would kill most other kangaroos.

These beautiful creatures get about in hot, steamy conditions — with virtually no food or water — from September to November.

Next, monsoon deluges hit the Antilopines for 3 months. For the rest of the year they have to work out a way of moving around through grass 2 metre high and across flooded plains stretching as far as the eye can see.

It’s hard to imagine a more difficult existence. Yet they remain one of Australia’s most graceful kangaroos. That’s why we named them: the Graceful Kangaroo

Image: Janine Duffy, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Mary River National Park, Northern Territory

Tour: Wild Top End

Kangaroos encapsulate poise, power, grace and speed but most of all, balance……

Balance, or rather counter-balance, resides in the spring-loaded tail. Hidden deep in the pelvis short, powerful ligaments hold the heavy tail in place. At each hop these ligaments gain, then release, enormous amounts of energy.

This is the secret of the macropods that enables them to move at surprisingly high speeds using very little energy.

Here’s how it works.

In our image (above) the heavy tail has begun to move downwards and the feet are returning to earth. As soon as that happens the massive achilles tendons (in the legs) will pre load with energy caused by the fall and the tail ligaments will reach maximum tension causing the tail to spring upwards.

It’s the combination of these two actions that raises the kangaroo into the next hop, all in one fluid motion.

What makes kangaroo’s hop so successful is this fact: the tail never hits the ground. By doing this kangaroos retain most of the kinetic energy of the previous hop for movement. Their tail is the counter balance that lifts them back into the air!

While all this is going on the kangaroo’s lungs will fill with air, pumped in by the simple movement of the hop. In one bound some kangaroos can cover up to 8 metres (24 feet) and keep doing it whilst breathing effortlessly.

A horse galloping at the same speed as this kangaroo would use up to four times more energy.

Image: Jeroen Wolfslag, Echidna Walkabout guest

Where: Western Plains near Melbourne, Victoria

Tour: Coast, Mountains, Outback

Nothing says “wild” like the desert and few animals know the arid country as well as the Western-grey kangaroo — or Choco Kangaroo

We call them “Chocos” — short for Chocolate Kangaroo — due to their rich brown colouring that sets them apart from the pale grey of their relative, the Eastern-grey kangaroo.

They thrive, even in the deepest drought, by eating desiccated grass that most other animals shun. When things get desperate these macropods will even eat wood. I’ve seen Western-greys nibbling twigs on saltbush killed by drought, which says a lot about how hardy these guys are — they’ll outlive the hardiest drought-tolerant vegetation!

An endearing quality of the Western-grey is its placidness; they will let you get quite close and often appear to be enjoying the encounter unlike their desert relative, the Red kangaroo.

Image: Roger Smith, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Mungo National Park

Tour: Mungo Outback Journeyshow less

Only found in a tiny area of the tropical Northern Territory the Black Wallaroo is Australia’s rarest and most enigmatic kangaroo. Few people ever see this animal in the wild……

We were lucky to capture this image from a boat on the remote East Alligator River near the border of Kakadu National Park and Arnhem Land.

Heat is the enemy of the Black Wallaroo which is why this smart animal has chosen a cool, shady airway high in the sandstone escarpment.

Why do we call it a “wallaroo”?

We call a few smaller kangaroos “wallaroos” because they are larger than wallabies but don’t reach the size of the larger kangaroos. It’s an arbitrary term that is confusing especially in the case of the Common Wallaroo which can be as large as most kangaroos.

Male Black Wallaroos are the only true black kangaroo (the female is dark grey).

Image: Roger Smith, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Arnhem Land, Northern Territory

Tour: Wild Top End

Fog is rare in the Australian desert. This unique kangaroo video portrays a female Western-grey kangaroo bounding through Mungo National Park in the early morning light…..

We create unique opportunities to see wildlife by rising early and getting started while the desert is cool. On this day we were rewarded by this stunning event that happened in perfect silence, not even broken by the sound of the kangaroo hopping.

Kangaroos can hop through dry leaves and over broken twigs soundlessly. If you watch closely you’ll note this female is looking carefully at the ground in front her and changing her gate to avoid hurting herself and to keep her movements as quiet as possible.

You’ll also see that her tail never touches the ground (see 7. Balance above for more information)

Video: Roger Smith, Echidna Walkabout (we’ve slowed it by 50% so you can see the action)

Where: Mungo National Park

Tour: Mungo Outback Journey

This is the unmistakable walking track of a macropod, possibly an Antilopine Kangaroo, embossed in the sand beside the Victoria River near Timber Creek in the Northern Territory…..

Early morning is the best time to look for signs of kangaroos during the night. This roo stopped beside a sandy track, placed its tail and forepaws on the ground, then swung its hindlegs forwards between its arms. It then lifted its tail briefly, moved to the right, then dropped its tail again.

Starting from the right of the photo you can see all of this movement: the two forepaws are the fan shapes (the two narrow short lines are the long claws of the forepaws as they drag forward); the two big prints are the long feet as they land either side and in front of the forepaws; then the tail lands in the heel of the bottom footprint and drags right over the top of the right footprint.

This whole action was repeated many times to the right of this image as the kangaroo walked down the road.

Image: Roger Smith, Echidna Walkabout

Where: Victoria River, Timber Creek, Northern Territory

Tour: Maximum Wildlife extended tour

Like many animals kangaroos are intrigued by children. They will tolerate much more from a child than they will from an adult…as long as the child respects the kangaroos personal space…

This photo represents one of the highlights of my career as a wildlife guide. This little girl and I crept up on the giant male Eastern-grey kangaroo and attendant female until we were within 5 metres of them. I was staggered by the reaction of the big male; he would normally have hopped away but he was spellbound by the girl and she by him!

After a few minutes the female roo hopped off but the male stayed, almost as if he had been drugged. The whole event was remarkable in so many ways, not the least of which was that the girl’s mother took this unique kangaroos image that I will treasure for the rest of my life.

Image: Child’s mother, Echidna Walkabout guest

Where: Serendip

Tour: Great Ocean Road

We’ve used this compelling kangaroo image many times and in may places. It evokes feelings in people that go beyond words and is very special to all of us at Echidna Walkabout.

I was with photographer Michael Williams when he set up for this photo. A single female Western-grey kangaroo had appeared out of the eroded sand dunes in Mungo National Park then sat quietly for a about 5 minutes surveying us and deciding what to do next.

At the exact moment Michael clicked the shutter the roo lifted her right foot in preparation to move down into the gully.

Mungo is a tough environment for any creature — the region was in the middle of a long period of drought and extreme temperatures. The image portrays everything that is harsh about the Outback.

Image: Michael Williams, “It’s a Wildlife”
(See more about Michael Williams in 3. Courtship)

Where: Mungo National Park

Tour: Mungo Outback Journey