How old were you when you went on your first-ever trip all on your own?
Maybe you were seven or eight or nine?
Maybe you’ve still never traveled alone!
Well, let me tell you that the first trip I ever made all by myself was the minute I was born.
Hello, my name is Basel, and I’m a joey—that’s a baby kangaroo.
When I was born, I was really tiny—literally the size of a jellybean, an olive, or a grape.
I was so small that I could’ve easily gotten lost in my mom’s fur, and nobody would’ve noticed!
I didn’t have any fur, and my eyes, ears, and organs weren’t fully developed.
There’s never a moment of rest for a newborn jellybean-sized joey. As soon as I was out of my mom’s belly, I had to start my long and difficult journey, all alone, from the birth canal all the way up to mom’s pouch.
How was I going to find my way there when I couldn’t yet see clearly?
Luckily, I was born with a strong sense of smell, so Mom licked a path for me through her fur, and I was able to smell her saliva and find my way home to the pouch.
It was still risky, and I had to be careful. If I fell off of Momma, there was no way I could climb back on. When you’re the size of a jellybean, it feels as if Mom is as big as a mountain!
What a long trip it was, crawling through a jungle of fur!
Finally, I found the pouch and climbed in, exhausted.
Now I could have my first meal: momma’s milk.
I latched onto the teat, but it’s hard to suckle when you’re just a little jellybean and everything is so much bigger! Momma to the rescue! She squeezed her stomach muscles and out gushed the milk. Yummy!
I’ve been in the pouch for eight months now. That’s a long time in joey days.
I grew bigger and bigger and now I am big healthy joey.
I hop out of the pouch to eat grass and plants, but I always hop back in for a good drink of milk and a nice long nap.
Momma said I’ll be staying for another three or four months.
And guess what? I’m not alone anymore!
As soon as I started leaving the pouch to eat, my little sister Nabila showed up!
Yup, just like that.
One day, Mom licked a path for her, and she found her way to the pouch. She’s so much younger, but it’s nice to have company, and now both of us share momma’s milk.
Amazingly, though, my milk tastes different from Nabila’s, and that’s the coolest thing about mommy kangaroos.
They can produce different types of milk at the same time, so each baby gets a good, nutritious meal that is just right for them.
Did you know that?
