Pastel on Supertooth paper

Image size 49 x 74cm

This Eastern grey kangaroo joey is one of last year’s young, and still happily follows mum wherever she goes. She is one of the free-ranging and true locals here in the Grampians National Park and her relatives have been here in their present form for around 2.5 million years! I reckon she has every right to lay about like some marsupial overlord in this backyard. We always give the roos the respect of prior occupation when they are at home here.

Although kangaroos have the most energy efficient form of locomotion of any land mammal on Earth, they are in fact mostly nocturnal feeders, spending large chunks of any given day resting in the shade. While photographing this girl I talked quietly to her, eventually, my voice soothing her enough that she lay down flat in the cool grass and went deeply asleep.