Furred Animals of Australia facts for kids

"Furred Animals of Australia" is a famous book about Australian mammals. It was first published in 1931. This book helps people learn about the unique animals that live in Australia. Many of these animals are marsupials, like kangaroos and koalas. The book was written by Ellis Le Geyt Troughton, a scientist who studied mammals. The beautiful color pictures were drawn by Neville W. Cayley. He was also famous for his bird book, What Bird is That?, which inspired Troughton's book title.

Discovering Australia's Furred Animals

Why This Book Was Important

Before Furred Animals of Australia, it was hard to find good information about Australian mammals. Older books were either very expensive or outdated. For example, John Gould's The Mammals of Australia from 1863 had great pictures. However, it was a rare and valuable collector's item. Other books copied information from an old list of mammal specimens from 1888. This meant much of the information was not new or accurate.

Ellis Troughton's book changed this. It became the main source of information about Australian mammals for many years. It was the first widely available and up-to-date guide.

Ellis Troughton's Research

Ellis Troughton was a mammalogist, meaning he studied mammals. He also worked as a museum curator. His research helped create this important book. The second edition of the book was printed in 1944, even though its title page said 1943.

Troughton did a lot of research on bats, which were not well-known in Australia. His book was the first to describe some new types of bats. Sometimes, his ideas about new species were later changed. But later studies showed that some of his ideas were actually correct. For example, Ronald Strahan, another mammalogist, said that Troughton was right to separate some animal groups, even if his reasons were different from what later scientists found.

A New Look for an Old Favorite

In 1987, Ronald Strahan reissued Troughton's book. He called it What Mammal is That?. Strahan wanted to show off Neville Cayley's amazing animal paintings. He added new text to go with Cayley's pictures. He also included some of Cayley's art that wasn't in the first book. Strahan even added new drawings by Peter Schouten to show species discovered since the original book.

Strahan explained that his new version was very different from Troughton's original. He said it only shared the name. When talking about Cayley's paintings, Strahan mentioned that they sometimes looked a bit flat compared to the older, detailed pictures in John Gould's 1863 book.