Ocean of Objects: Plants and Animals

Many plants and animals have crossed the Indian Ocean. Some were taken to grow as crops and keep for food in new places — Indonesian rice to Madagascar and Southeast Asian bananas to Africa, camels from Arabia and India have been brought to Australia, chickens have been moved all around the Ocean. Others have been sent across the sea as presents between rulers or to sell in other places—giraffes as gifts to the China, Arab horses sold in India, Australian sheep exported to the Middle East. Others still have simply hitched a ride to find new homes, like rats and house shrews, or were left behind by accident like the Tamarind trees in northern Australia that grew from seeds left behind by Makassan visitors.

Tracing the travels of these plants and animals is an exciting area of science using genetics as well as evidence from archaeology and history to tell new and different stories of the Ocean.

Hitching a Ride

Model of Asian house gecko (Hemidactylus frenatus)
Western Australian Museum

This little gecko is one of the animals that has spread around the Indian Ocean to find new places to live. The Asian house gecko originally lived in the forests of Southeast Asia, but found a new home when humans started to build houses and villages. Able to hide away in boats and ships, it spread to India, and many islands in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific. It is still travelling and in the last 50 years has reached Mexico, the USA and Australia. Geckos have been in Darwin since at least the 1960s, and arrived in Brisbane in the 1980s. They can also be found in towns along the northwest coast of WA and in Perth.

All the Way From Africa

Aepyornis Maximus fossilised egg
2,000 BP
Western Australian Museum, A39282

This is a fossilised egg from the Madagascan Elephant Bird Aepyornis Maximus, a now extinct, flightless bird native to Madagascar and thought to have stood over 3 m tall. Radiocarbon dating places this specimen at around 2,000 years old.

This is one of two intact specimens found washed up on the Western Australian coast over the last 100 years. The first was discovered in 1930 at Scott River, 300 km south of Perth. The second was found at Cervantes, 200 km north of Perth in 1992 by three children.

Although found 500 km apart, both eggs originated 6,970 km away on the island nation of Madagascar, off the coast of Africa. So, how did they make it all this way? It is widely believed these eggs, like humans, travelled on the Indian Ocean, using ocean currents and winds to make their journey to Australia.