Northern Brown Bandicoot

The Northern Brown Bandicoot (Isoodon macrourus) is a common bandicoot in the suburban gardens along the east coast of Australia, being a regular visitor to many people's gardens and lawns during the winter months.

It prefers areas of low ground cover, including tall grass and dense shrubbery, irrespective of the presence or absence of a tree canopy or tree spacing. In the Bayside region it's habitat includes grassland, woodland and open forest and closed forest.

The Bandicoot's day is spent in a well concealed nest consisting of a heap of ground litter over a shallow depression, providing an internal chamber with loose regions at each end for entry and exit. A layer of soil may be kicked over the top of the nest in rainy weather for waterproofing; bandicoots being regarded as having an instinct for detecting bad weather, as they go into a feverish activity of adding material to their nest, before the rainy event. Animals may also rest up in hollow logs, or under tussocks.

At night it moves over a home range of 1 to 6 ha in search of food (supplemented, in the male, by a more rapid and directed patrolling of the range). Although it prefers insects and eats other invertebrates such as spiders and earthworms, it is omnivorous, and also eats berries, grass seeds and plant fibre such as sugar cane. Food is obtained mainly on the surface of the ground or by digging in the soil with the strong forepaws.

Bandicoots are speckled black and brown above and whitish below. Males are larger than females, have larger canine teeth, are more aggressive, and have larger home ranges. Males grow to about 400mm in length with a tail of about 170mm, and weighing about 2.1kg, while females grow to about 350mm / 130mm respectively and weigh 1.1kg.

In males a gland behind the ear is used for marking the ground and vegetation during aggressive encounters. Males and females appear to come together only for mating, which is preceded by persistent following of the female until she accepts mounting. In Southeastern Queensland breeding may occur throughout the year. There are 8 nipples and the litter size is 1 to 7, usually 2 to 4. The gestation period is 12.5 days, as in the Long-nosed Bandicoot, these two species sharing the shortest gestation known for any mammal. The young are weaned when about 2 months old. Some females may mate and become pregnant again when the young reach about 50 days of age and a new litter is born as soon as the previous one is weaned. Since females become sexually mature before they are fully grown and can produce several litters during the breeding season, a high reproductive rate is possible.

European settlement has caused the withdrawal of the Northern Brown Bandicoot from much of its inland range in pastoral country, and patchy extinction has occurred in coastal areas subject to intensive development, farming or grazing.