Goodfellow’s Tree Kangaroo Kaluli

Tree Kangaroo mums are sticklers for a clean baby, and Kaluli is the living proof! If you’re lucky, you’ll see her giving her joey Muku a good groom when you visit.

Tree Kangaroo’s are only pregnant for around 40 days, but their jellybean-sized joeys will stay inside their pouch for another seven to nine months while they grow!

Our little Muku has just started to hop in and out to explore the world around her.
 
Squirrel Monkeys Sue and Vivo

Well, they say it takes a village and in a Squirrel Monkey troop that certainly rings true!

Sue and Vivo both recently welcomed bouncing bubs, but the whole troop takes on a role with newborns.

The mums will identify an 'aunty’ to help them raise their little ones, a behaviour that you don’t see in many species! Despite living in groups of tens or hundreds with multiple mums and aunties around, a Squirrel Monkey mum will always recognize her own baby.

Our newest additions have been sticking to their mums like little backpacks, which makes for quite a sight as their mums jump around their habitat.
 
Numbat Mums Galore!

Like all marsupials, a numbats pregnancy is quite short. In fact, it only lasts around two weeks!

But once born, their joeys will stay attached to them for the first six months of their life.

When the joeys reach six months of age, mum deposits them underground and continues to feed and nurture them until they are 11 months old!

The joeys will then bravely venture out of their burrow and into the world.
 
Giraffe Kitoto

Not only is our Kitoto a mum, but she’s also a grandmother!

Giraffes give birth standing up and calves are born with a dramatic drop to the ground!

They’re resilient babies and within hours the calf is able to walk, but it remains closely guarded by its mum and the rest of the herd for several weeks.
 
Orangutan Sekara

The bond between an orangutan mother and her young is one of the strongest in nature!

Not only does an orangutan mum teach her babies how to survive and find food, but she also carries them for the first few years of their life and builds a new nest every single day. The average orangutan mother will build up to 30,000 homes in her lifetime – talk about a SuperMum!

We have been lucky to witness the parenting techniques of orangutan first-hand. They can be very playful with their babies but can also have a strict side – just like a human mother!

Sekara has been described as a bit of a ‘helicopter parent’, with great attention to detail, making sure her little ones know not to snatch food, how to forage, and how to build their own nest.