Kangaroo Development: Stranger Than Fiction

Growing up, I always thought that joeys — baby kangaroos residing in the pouches of their mothers — were born fully developed, then placed in the pouch for ease of transport like a marsupial BabyBjörn. When I got older, I thought that joeys existed in their mothers’ pouches for the entirety of their development — from eggs all the way through the time that they are old enough to emerge. It turns out that both of these assumptions are entirely wrong, and that kangaroo gestation and development is far more interesting than I had ever believed.