This roo is hard to miss with its eye-catching coat, but firefighter Berni Mitchell is asking people to stay away. Photos: Nerriga Rural Fire Brigade Facebook.
Fireys are keeping tight-lipped about where a special resident is making its home in bushland near Nerriga.
Members of Nerriga’s Rural Fire Brigade and volunteers from Braidwood were called up for a search after smoke was reported in the area.
Nerriga deputy captain Berni Mitchell was in a vehicle with another firefighter when a roo caught their eye on Monday afternoon (28 September).
“We were basically just investigating, trying to find the smoke column, which we couldn’t find – luckily. No smoke, no fire!
“Just before we’d finished our investigation, we drove past [a field], and both myself and the other member went, ‘Is that what we think it is?'”
In the middle of a field was a white kangaroo munching on grass, with some friends nearby.
Ms Mitchell believes the rare roo is an albino.
White kangaroos are incredibly rare, with one estimate suggesting the genetic mutation that affects their pigmentation occurs in one in every 100,000 kangaroos.
The exact discovery site has been kept secret to protect the kangaroo.
Once the fireys had finished their search duties, they returned to take photos of the kangaroo.
Ms Mitchell told Region it was with a group of other kangaroos, including a joey, but they stayed far away to avoid disturbing the group.
“We don’t know if it was a male or female, because of the distance … [The sighting] was over a fence, and we didn’t want to get close and scare the wildlife,” she said.
“But it definitely looked at us like we were the weird ones in bright yellow!”
Ms Mitchell said the sighting of the group renewed her hopes that a local population was recovering and that while it made for a memorable day at work, it meant more than seeing another kangaroo.
“A lot of people are saying, ‘Oh, there’s one in Nerriga’ … If it is from Nerriga, it’s travelled a distance to where it is.
“But it’s good to see that the kangaroos are around still, especially in those areas.”
Ms Mitchell: ‘You see them [albino kangaroos] in photos, but I’ve never seen one in the wild before.’
Ms Mitchell urged motorists to be careful when navigating the area.
“Because of not having a lot of rain, they’re starting to come closer to the road for feed, so it is making it a little bit more dangerous when we’re driving in emergency situations,” she said.
“Not only are we looking for smoke and fire, we’ve also got to keep our eye on the wildlife.”
Ms Mitchell hoped keeping the kangaroo’s location a secret would keep the animal safe, pointing to a viral Facebook post that had more than 77,000 views.
“That’s huge for a little brigade like us,” she said of the social media reach.
“The last thing we want is people trying to find it – or, unfortunately, people going to hunt it.
“That location will definitely be kept with the members that were with us. … I can say, it wasn’t in Nerriga [in the village].”
