Tonight's tour was wet and some of our guests from north Queensland really felt the cold. But as normal everybody admired Gumbah, our big male koala. He weighs about 14kg, over 30lbs, and is much bigger than the Queensland koalas most people come close to. As is often the case, he was asleep, and curled up in a ball to keep warm, waking briefly to the delight of the visitors. But what is not often realised is that his sheer physical size is an adaptation to the colder southern climate. A bigger body means a higher mass to body surface area, meaning more heat created and less heat lost. So a rule in zoology, "Bergmann's Rule", says that the further away you are from the equator, the bigger you are. Add to that Gumbah's thick fluffy fur coat, and the Victorian koala is an impressive animal. Handsome too!
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