Mor e than 150 gorg eous phot os of baby an imals with fun facts & easy -to-follow information.
Ba by Animals
FROGS
From water to land
Tadpoles changing to become frogs
Frogs are very odd animals because they live in the water as babies, then live on land as adults. This means a frog’s body changes a lot as it grows up. A frog starts out with gills, no legs and a tail, but ends up with lungs, four legs and no tail! Tyler’s tree-frogs
To make babies, adult frogs may mate for weeks before any eggs are laid. The eggs, called spawn, are laid all together in one sticky, jelly-like blob. Fr og sp
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A big change The eggs finally hatch as tiny swimming tadpoles that breathe through gills, just like fish do. After about six weeks, the tadpoles start to grow tiny back legs. Later, at nine weeks, their front legs grow. Finally, their tails shrink and their lungs grow.
Green tree-frogs
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Tadpoles that hop in
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Often, the baby frogs have left the water by the time their tails start to shrink. This means you may sometimes see frogs with tails hopping around in the rushes or reeds near creeks! All frogs need water to survive, so most adult frogs like to live in streams or near waterfalls.
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From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
KANGAROOS & WALLABIES
Popped in a pouch Like all marsupial babies, joeys are born very small and furless and must quickly crawl through their mother’s thick fur to the safety of the pouch. They grow bigger in the pouch for almost half a year before things start to get a little cramped! Even after a joey leaves the pouch, Western brush wallaby it may still pop its head in for a drink of milk from time to time.
Eastern grey kangaroo
In the pouch, the joey is safe from harm. But once it leaves the pouch it can be caught by hungry predators. The joey has to learn to watch out for danger and to hop fast, so it stays close to its mum for almost a year.
Western grey kangaroo joey
Jellybean babies
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When they are born, joeys are only the size of a jellybean. They cannot see and have bright pink skin with no fur at all. They suckle, or drink, their lla a w mother’s milk until they can Tammar see, grow fur and eat grass.
A baby red-necked wallaby only starts to eat grass when it is more than a year old.
Red-necked wallaby
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Black-footed rock-wallabies
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A very cosy home Some joeys do not want to leave their cosy pouch home, even when they have grown too big for it. By then, their mother usually has a little brother or sister on the way, so she kicks the joey out and cleans the pouch for the next baby. From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
SEAHORSES & SEADRAGONS
Big-bellied dads Seahorses and seadragons are strange-looking Seadragons creatures and their babies grow in strange ways too! In a seahorse or seadragon family, the dad is the one that gets pregnant. Seahorse babies grow in their father’s belly. Seadragon eggs grow on a spongy patch under their dad’s tail. Male big-bellied seahorse giving birth
Mother and father bigbellied seahorses stay together for life. When they decide to have babies, they do a special dance together, swimming up to the water’s surface. During the dance, the mother places her eggs in a pouch on the father’s tummy, where they grow until they hatch. Many hundreds of tiny seahorses hatch more than a month later.
Mini vacuum cleaners
Seahorse
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Baby seahorses are called fry. They are slow swimmers that use their strong, curly tails to grip onto objects to avoid being swept away. Their long, thin snouts are used to “vacuum” up food from the water.
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Leafy seadragon & eggs
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s d a d n o g a Seadr It may not look like it, but seadragons are really a type of fish. Their babies grow in eggs that attach to a spot under the male’s tail. When they hatch, the babies are only about 3 cm long. From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
PLATYPUSES & ECHIDNAS
Puggles & “platypups”
Puggle
Echidnas and the platypus are very special mammals called monotremes. They are incredible because they are the only mammals that lay eggs. When the eggs hatch, platypus and echidna mothers feed their babies milk. The babies then grow hair, just like other mammals. Platyp
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A mother platypus digs a burrow in a riverbank and lays 2–3 eggs. She keeps the eggs warm by curling around them for ten days. When they hatch, baby platypuses are blind and helpless. They lap at milk that oozes from their mum’s belly. Although a baby echidna is known as a puggle, no-one has yet come up with a name for a baby platypus. One suggested name is a “platypup”. Platypus burrow
Babies in a burrow Two baby platypuses usually hatch at once. They live in the warm, dry burrow, drinking their mother’s milk for around four months before entering the water.
Mother & puggle
Mother echidnas lay only one egg and keep it warm in a pouch, which is really just a flap of skin on the belly. The egg hatches after ten days and a naked, clawless, soft-nosed little puggle comes out. Once the puggle starts to grow sharp spines, it leaves the pouch and stays in a burrow while its mum hunts.
Roly poly puggle
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An echidna’s spines are just a different type of hair. It takes more than a month for a puggle to grow these sharp spines. Baby echidnas also have to learn how to roll themselves up into a ball or dig into the soil if enemies attack. From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
GROUND BIRDS
Baby “big birds”
Cassowary chicks
Emus are the second-largest birds in the world after the ostrich, so of course their eggs are very big too. Neither the emu nor the southern cassowary, which is another large Australian ground bird, can fly. For both birds, the dads sit on the eggs and look after the chicks once they hatch.
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Southern cassowary & chicks
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Adult cassowaries have glossy black feathers and blue faces, as well as a hard “hump”, called a casque, on their heads. But cassowary chicks are pale and stripy with no hump. Unlike most bird babies, they can walk and run very soon after they hatch. Although the mother lays four large green-coloured eggs, it is the dad who sits on them for months until they hatch. During this time, the father hardly ever leaves the nest to eat, drink or even poo.
Hard-working dad The malleefowl is another ground bird that rarely flies. A father malleefowl has a very big job — building a huge mound nest of dirt and leaves. He has to keep the nest at just the right warmth, because if the eggs get too hot or too cold, they may not hatch.
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Father emu & chicks
e g g i g b s , d r i b Big Emu eggs are huge, about ten times bigger than a chicken’s egg that you might eat for breakfast. They are also very hard. Baby emus have a special hard part called an “egg tooth” on their beaks, which helps them break out of the shell. From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
Chick & eggs
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GLOSSARY
BROOD A group of young animals. CAMOUFLAGE Colouring that helps an animal blend in with its backgound. CHRYSALIS A cocoon made by a caterpillar before it becomes a butterfly or moth.
ORPHAN An animal or person that has no living parents. PREDATOR An animal that hunts and eats other animals.
COLONY A group of animals living together.
PREY An animal that is hunted and eaten by other animals. Can also mean to hunt.
CRECHE A French word that means nursery.
PUPA The life stage of an insect inside a cocoon.
DREY A nest of leaves that possums or gliders live in.
ROOST A place where some animals, such as bats and birds, rest or sleep.
EMBRYO A very young animal before birth or hatching.
SCAVENGE To find and eat dead animals.
FLEDGLING A young bird that is starting to fly.
WATERPROOF Able to stay dry in the rain or underwater.
GAPE The inside of a young bird’s mouth when open. Can also mean to open the mouth wide. GILLS Special slits in a fish or tadpole’s throat that help them to breathe underwater. HABITAT The place where an animal lives and breeds or where a plant grows. HATCHLING A young animal that has recently broken free from its egg. LARVA The grub-like stage of some insects’ life cycle. MAMMAL A class of animal that has fur and feeds its babies milk. MARSUPIAL A type of mammal that gives birth to underdeveloped babies that grow in a pouch. MATE When a male animal transfers special cells to a female’s eggs, which causes young to develop. MONOTREME A special type of mammal that lays eggs.
From Steve Parish Publishing’s Nature Watch: Baby Animals ~ www.steveparish.com.au
TEAT A nipple.