{"id":140421,"date":"2025-09-13T15:12:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T15:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/140421\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T15:12:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T15:12:11","slug":"white-wallaby-rescued-from-side-of-the-road-in-dartford","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/140421\/","title":{"rendered":"White wallaby rescued from side of the road in Dartford"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1757508964_896_grey-placeholder.png\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 iMuqLZ hide-when-no-script\" aria-label=\"image unavailable\"\/><img decoding=\"async\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/07d76460-90a7-11f0-9fb1-e7b7d96e6198.jpg.webp.webp\" loading=\"eager\" alt=\"Jag Alli A small, white wallaby standing on the side of a road.\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 fHZDyi\"\/>Jag Alli<\/p>\n<p>The wallaby has been reunited with its owner<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">A white wallaby has been rescued and reunited with its owner after being found on the side of a road in Kent.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Kent Police said officers were called to Trolling Down Hill in Dartford at about 09:30 BST on Friday to a report of the animal in the area.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;Officers attended to ensure the safety of road users and of the animal,&#8221; the force added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;Enquiries were completed and the wallaby was safely reunited with its owner shortly after 10am.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1757508964_896_grey-placeholder.png\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 iMuqLZ hide-when-no-script\" aria-label=\"image unavailable\"\/><img decoding=\"async\"   src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/2f932a30-90a6-11f0-9fb1-e7b7d96e6198.jpg.webp.webp\" loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"Jag Alli The back of a small, white wallaby standing on the side of a road.\" class=\"sc-86c96223-0 fHZDyi\"\/>Jag Alli<\/p>\n<p>The animal was found in Dartford<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Wallabies are primarily found in Australia and nearby islands, and are members of the macropod family of marsupials, along with kangaroos.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">They are typically small to medium-sized and have powerful hind legs that they use to bound along at high speeds and jump distances.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">A <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1002\/ece3.6877\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 jZoZnB\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">research paper in 2020<\/a> by Holly M. English of University College Dublin and Anthony Caravaggi of the University of South Wales looked into wallabies in the UK.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">They believed wallabies were likely first brought to the UK for zoos as well as for private collections in the late 19th Century.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">From then, it is believed that during World Wars One and Two some were <a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/cd6n71ewzzwo\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 jZoZnB\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">released into the countryside<\/a> as people were unable to look after them.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">Helen Pearson, head of animal studies at Suffolk Rural, <a target=\"_self\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/c74wr2g4w2po\" class=\"sc-f9178328-0 jZoZnB\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">which has its own wallabies<\/a>, said they could survive &#8220;quite well&#8221; in the UK.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;They live in shrubland out there, so as much as you think Australia is quite hot, they cope quite well in our climate,&#8221; she explained.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-9a00e533-0 bJoRPJ\">&#8220;They&#8217;re really hardy animals.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jag Alli The wallaby has been reunited with its owner A white wallaby has been rescued and reunited&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140422,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[64,63,128,338],"class_list":{"0":"post-140421","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140421\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140422"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}