Frankie’s Bandicoot Facts

Some advice from Frankie:

"Be a responsible cat owner - keep cats inside at night. Ideally cats should be kept in an outdoor enclosure if you live near a reserve."

"Be a responsible dog owner - keep dogs on lead when walking through the Pines."

"Stay on tracks when walking in the Pines and use only bicycle tracks where permitted."

"Protect our reserve, protect plants - even dead timber or leaves on ground are important."

"Join with your local community to protect Bandicoot habitat."

Bandicoots love living in The Pines

Southern Brown Bandicoots were once a common feature of the Melbourne region. People have even reported a time when Bandicoots foraged in Melbournian backyards! Now Bandicoots are very rare.  Bandicoots can still be found in the Pines Reserve - it is one of the reasons why the Pines is such a special place.

Bandicoots prefer areas with relatively dense vegetation up to one metre above the ground to provide cover. This cover can be provided by many native species including Tea Trees and bracken.

The area a Bandicoot needs to live in depends on a number of factors, such as what the environment is like, how much and what type of food is available. Home ranges of Southern Brown Bandicoots have been recorded between less than 1 hectare up to 6 hectares. Individual home ranges are not known to overlap greatly between animals of the same sex, but may overlap considerably between sexes. Southern Brown Bandicoots are predominantly solitary.

The Southern Brown Bandicoot

The Southern Brown Bandicoot, Isoodon obesulus is a small and quick marsupial, it is an Australian animal that is now considered rare. It has a long snout, small round ears, a short tail and a large bum. They are roughly a third to half the size of a rabbit and can look like a large rat. They have brown fur with golden speckles and a pale cream coloured underbelly. Southern Brown Bandicoots are active both at night (nocturnal) and during the day, but are most active in the late afternoon or evening. 

Southern Brown Bandicoots live on the ground and hunt for their food under leaf litter and in the soil. They dig little conical holes in the soil while searching for grubs and fungi. Bandicoots scats or poo can help researchers to understand what foods bandicoots like to eat. In one scat scientists found 29 different types of fungi!

Bandicoots pretty much scrounge around for anything other than plant leaves, but really their staple diet round here will be beetles, ants or other soil dwelling bugs, underground fungi and roots or fruit.

Bandicoots build nests in small hollows on the ground. These nests consist of leaf litter that the coots cover with soil.  Leaf litter falling from the nearby vegetation hides these nests. Southern Brown Bandicoots are not known to construct burrows, but will occasionally use burrows made by other animals during adverse weather or for resting in.

Southern Brown Bandicoots have young from late winter through to summer.  Gestation period is between 12 - 13 days after which the young move to their mother's pouch for a period of about 6 weeks. Youngsters are weaned between 60 - 70 days, growing at a rapid rate and breeding when they are quite young.  Bandicoots only live for an average of 3 years. Young coots probably leave their home area soon after weaning in search of a new place to live, this is when they are very vulnerable and many don't survive this transition. Bandicoots live mostly solitary lives and do not usually nest or feed together.