Koala by Danielle Clode is an engaging and informative exploration into one of the world's most unique and interesting animals.

Inside joke, but some of my friends call me koala. I'm not explaining.

I've always been curious about the adorable creatures, and decided to pick this one up. While it started off kind of slow, it began to pick up at the end.

Islands are dangerous for ecosystems, especially ones that burn as frequently as Australia. These tiny cute animals have been endangered on and off for years. I didn't realize their export was illegal until SD petitioned to house some at their zoo. They are expensive to house, as they must have the eucalyptus trees they're used to eating.

Also didn't realize they were spreading STDs like wildfire. The more you know.

I have been reading this one off and on for a couple of months. Nonfiction is not my thing so I just read a chapter here and there but close to the end I did not want to put the book down. I have loved koalas all of my life so when I saw this book available on netgalley I had to have it. This book starts millions of years ago so when it says a history, it means a history. Also, the author is a zoologist and that shows as well. There are so many technical terms and you learn every piece of the koala inside and out. SO many scientific facts! My poor husband as I read and told him so many facts about the koala. I learned so much! One day I will go to Australia and see a koala in the wild!

-Koalas are simply unlike anything else we know of.

-...almost two thirds of Australia's native mammals are marsupials. No other landmass in the world is as dominated by marsupials as Australia.

-Cute and cuddly, but with razor claws.

-They have three fingers and two thumbs.

-They are also the only species to have fingerprints other than humans, chimpanzees, and gorillas.

-It's not like they'll eat any old gum leaves. Koalas are notoriously fussy about their food.

-Of the hundreds of species of eucalypts found across Australia, only seventy percent or so are recognized as koala food trees and, of these, any one individual koala might only eat three or five or ten different species.

-I remember reading somewhere that koala fur is so think and waterproof that it was once popular for lining the greatcoats of northern armies in Siberia and fur trappers in the depths of the Canadian Yukon.

-The technical description for koala's mating call is snoring-like inhalations followed by resonant growling expirations. Some call them tree pigs or unkindly compare their calls to the braying of a donkey or the guttural sound of something stuck in a garbage disposal.

-From conception to birth is only thirty-five days.

-But I do know that koalas, like all of us, need something to hold, whether it's a tree or the warmth of another body.

-In the end, it was not he Australian government who stopped the slaughter, but an American president. Hoover responded by prohibiting the importation of koala and wombat skins into the United States, and the trade eventually dried up.

-Koalas are the million dollar babies. They raise more funds than any other species in the world.

-Over the course of their evolutionary history, koalas have responded to climate change, disease, changing forests, increasing aridity, predation and hunting. And they have survived.

-The story of the koala has taken me into the distant past, across continent and cultures and through an incredibly wide range of knowledge systems: botany, ecology, Indigenous knowledge, evolution, palaeontology, anatomy, conservation biology, history, toxicology, psychology, veterinary and nutritional science, and animal behavior.
(I wasn't kidding about all the science in this book!)