wondiwoi tree kangaroo

Much mystery had traditionally surrounded this lost species. When the kangaroo was first found in the Wondiwoi Peninsula of West Papua in mossy montane forests at an elevation of 1,600 meters, scientists couldn’t figure out how it came to inhabit the higher parts of the Wondiwoi Peninsula—the answer remains elusive as an enduring “zoo-geographical mystery.” Everything we know about the Wondiwoi Tree Kangaroo came from a single individual, an adult male collected in 1928 by one of the world’s leading evolutionary biologists, Ernst Mayr.

In 2018, a tourist in West Papua took low-quality photos of the species that experts identified as the Wondiwoi Tree Kangaroo. Future expeditions can help obtain DNA samples and higher-quality images, while also informing conservation measures to protect the species.