Koala Paintings
This series of oil on canvas paintings are of ‘Lake Private’, a now permanent resident of Port Macquarie’s Koala Hospital. He obligingly posed for my camera, strutting up and down his branch whilst I photographed him. You can read more about Lake Private below.
Sitter: “Lake Private” (? – 2012)
Port Macquarie Koala Hospital
I decided to do some photo shoots for future koala portraits so went to the Port Macquarie Koala Hospital expecting I’d be photographing many of the residents. First sitter I met was “Lake Private” who proceeded to steal the show – striking poses and stalking me until I gave up photographing anyone else and just concentrated on him.
All the koala portraits I painted are of Lake Private. He was a lovely old koala and the following excerpt from “Gum Tips” March 2011 gives some of his background story.
“This aged male koala was first admitted in 2003 as a young animal after being hit by a car late one night on a busy arterial road (Lake Road) in the heart of Port Macquarie right outside the local private hospital. As he was quite severely injured by the accident and was lying flat on the road, two of the nurses from the private hospital came out, picked him up and brought him into the private hospital, where they wrapped him in blankets and waited for someone from the Koala Hospital to arrive. Hence his name ―Lake Private.
Lake Private was treated for his injuries and released about half a kilometre from the accident site some weeks later. His home range has always been around this location and since 2003 he has been admitted to the Koala Hospital six times!! Poor old Private‘s home range is located not only on a very busy road, but is surrounded by a large number of doctors‘ surgeries, and specialist medical facilities. With Port Macquarie having a predominately ―older population, these medical facilities are a hive of activity every day.
Lake Private has run the gauntlet so many times and has really tempted fate. It has amazed us that he has survived there for so long. Two of his favourite food trees that he was often spotted in, were cut down (both right on the main road) which didn’t help matters. One of them was in the cardiologists carpark!
He has been picked up in backyards with Rottweiler, dogs, he has been stuck up banana trees right on the edge of a swampy area, he was found in a small tree in the ―working end of a funeral home which fronts a four lane main road, and has been seen crossing Lake Road during the middle of the day on more than one occasion (with good ol Private stopping all the traffic including buses).
How he hasn’t been hit by a car since 2003 is simply beyond belief. In early February this year we received a call for a ―distressed koala running around on the ground in a caravan park some 80 kms south of Port Macquarie. Low and behold when the koala was brought into the hospital it turned out to be guess who….Lake Private. He certainly looked a bit worse for wear, having lost some weight and was in a rather shabby condition and when placed on the treatment room table for examination the first thing he did was lick his lips in anticipation of a drink of formula!! Who says koalas are not intelligent!!
As there is no way, an aged male would be able to travel 80 kms away from their home range (lots of massive obstacles including a big wide river on the way) and from a behavioral view wouldn’t do it anyway and achieve this since his last admission which was in November 2010 then there is really only one explanation. We feel some well meaning good Samaritan has seen Lake Private doing his usual thing of being in a dangerous spot somewhere and as he is a pleasant easy going sort of koala, they have picked him up, headed south and released him in the caravan park which does have quite a good lot of koala food trees growing there (and has an already established population of resident koalas).
At the time of writing this article Lake Private has gained weight and is looking decidedly better and has been moved into the very large Yard 9 (with grumpy Westhaven Barry who is not impressed at all).
The decision on what to do with Lake Private at this point is still undecided – meanwhile he simply is enjoying 5 star accommodation at the Koala Hospital.”