SOUNDS LIKE: You have eschewed modern life and joined your new BFF — a wombat — to live a life of naps, snacks and cute attacks.
CONTAINS: A clear, cold night and the wombats are stirring, stomping, scratching and most of all, crunching their way through about 2kgs of grass. Nearby, the wombat's neighbours undertake nocturnal shenanigans and no-one seems to get any sleep. Except you. There are birds which should be awake, birds which should be asleep, possums and the star of the show — the bare-nosed wombats.
RECOMMENDED FOR: Explorers and the curious, those who want to feel awe and joy at discovering secrets that nature holds close to her chest.
ANN'S NERDY SOUND NOTES:
I didn't set out to record wombats. But when I went out one evening on Ngunnawal Country in the ACT, I stumbled upon an area that was almost as if it'd been exploded from below - there were holes and dirt EVERYWHERE.
And I know a wombat poo when I see one -> 🟫 <-
So, I found an active burrow entrance, with some grass nearby (that I thought could be quite delicious to a wombat) and attached the recorder at stumpy-little-hairy-leg height.
The Murrumbidgee River is flowing about 10 metres away. Its banks are lined by big old eucalypts and a fair amount of scratchy vegetation (ask me how I know.)
Bare-nosed (or common) wombats do lots of scratching. Lots of eating. A bit of bulldozing through things, maybe a fight. And that's just one night!
00:01:30 Boobook calls. And in the distance, almost imperceptibly to the human ear in this recording, another answer.
00:01:50 A micro bat flies past - you can hear a series of extremely high pitched 'pips' that doppler.
00:03:10 A bat feeding buzz - the echo location calls are much, much closer together as it zeros in on its prey. And no, I have no idea what the wood ducks are going on about.
00:04:08 Wood ducks like to roost in trees, nest in hollows, and sometimes, make noises like cats. You can hear the ducks roosting in different parts across the river and across answering back.
00:07:56 A brushtail possum staking it's claim in the trees they sound like a cross between a smoker's cough and the flush of a toilet.
00:09:17 I'm calling it. That's a waterbird doing a poo over the water.
00:10:50 Who flies around at night AND makes water landings? Wood ducks.
I expected many things from this soundscape, but I did not expect the wood ducks to be quite so active in the night. They barely get any sleep!
00:15:48 let the munching begin.
00:16:20 There are lambs somewhere in the distance. The area is full of merino farms and Namadgi National Park.
00:16:30 The slow cracking of sticks sounds mammalian - and there are multiple species in the area. In favour of the wombat, I can't hear the movement normally associated with macropod grazing: a slow gait of back legs and front legs/tail. Also, it sounds like it's pushing through stuff, which... is a very wombat thing to do.
00:23:45 A rooster in the distance.
00:26:30 Lot s of pulling and ripping and chewing and stomping.
00:27:15 –The frog chorus in this recording contains the average suspects crinia signifera and crinia parasignifera the common eastern froglet and the sign-bearing froglet.
I think there is also spotted marsh frog in there, though not in the same numbers or frequency of calls as the others, and perhaps a distant pobblebonk.
00:30:22 I am over 95% sure of that little harsh screaming grating sound in the distance? That is a grumpy wombat telling another wombat to back off.
00:30:54 Wombat smoker's cough? I'm imagining it like Ben Affleck outside the burrow. Just having a moment.
00:33:10 Superb fairy wren.
00:35:40 Lots going on here - the wombat pushing through sticks, there's chewing, a boobook, an owlet nightjar, a brush tail possum and the frog chorus.
00:37:20 Though this sounds a little bit like a barn owl, it probably is a wombat they make a grating, hissing, deathly call when they're having a territorial dispute. They also bulldoze around.
00:38:00 The screaming call of a wombat, perhaps a female. In between you can hear lower growling grunts.
00:39:00 A sequence featuring the wombat chewing, a fairy wren and then a masked lapwing (AKA PLOVER!)
00:44:40 Wombat scratchy.
00:46:58 Sulphur-crested cockatoos in the distance (thank goodness - they're pretty raucous)
00:49:45 The lapwings are upset by something. You can hear the bird doing it's circle of the area to assess danger and give warnings to all who come.
00:53:55 A wombat sigh.
