Bees, Sea Lions & Koalas

During the school holidays we flew over to Adelaide in South Australia and drove down the coast to take a ferry over to Kangaroo Island with Dani’s grandmother and his auntie in tow…

Kangaroo Island has been called ‘the Australian Galpágos’. I actually read that somewhere recently and took it with the pinch of salt it deserved. However, there is some great and rare wildlife on Kangaroo Island. The very name suggests so right? Well, we were about to find out…

First we had to get there on a ferry from Cape Jervis.

The Big Bee?

The island is small in comparison to the country but in its own right it is large. It is bigger than the Spanish island of Mallorca and half the size of Cyprus. There are strict controls on what you can take over there. You cannot even take honey across as the island is home to the only pure breed of Ligurian bees on the planet. Apparently there could be some bacteria in the honey from other bees that may affect the island bees. I am still not fully sure about that but those are the rules.

At the Island Beehive, just outside the town of Kingscote, you can see these pure bred Ligurian bees and buy their honey. We bought some and it was OK. I would not say much better or worse than any other great honey we have eaten in Australia but who am I to pass judgement?

You can also see The Big Bee – yet another of “The ‘Bigs’ of Australia”. Not huge but it does appear on some “Big Thing” lists you find online.

Curiously there are a lot of these signs around the island. I have no idea why. Are there people from right hand driving countries flying directly onto the island then hiring cars? If anyone knows please tell us.

  Sea Lions

What is the difference between a seal and a sea lion? They are different animals. Yet at Seal Bay on Kangaroo Island you can see plenty Sea Lions. Another odd thing about this place, but still a great spot to visit.

This is a protected area with access to much of it strictly controlled but they do take you down onto the beach where you can get up very close to the sea lions. There’s not much more to say really as I think the photos tell the story…

Don’t be fooled. These creatures are faster than you might think. They have teeth like a dog and the adults are big. You definitely would not want to get int an argument with one.

Dani took this last photo of two gulls copulating. He spotted them and shouted “Look, that one is having a piggy-back!” – which I thought was both funny and innocent.

Koalas

Koalas are not natives of Kangaroo Island. They were introduced in the 1920s as part of a protection programme. We were lucky enough to see a few. this one on the way out of Seal Bay.