After years of ski touring, it wasn't until I drove up the road from Thredbo to build a snowman with the kids that I bumped into a mob of brumbies NB: I've got to get a digital camera. Scans of photos just are not good enough.
I got some on my phone Camera on my last trip to Falls Creek, halfway betweeen Pilot Lookout and Leatherbarrel Creek lots of snow around too.... I asked LRB to take some pics, but he zoomed in on one of them instead of taking a pic of the mob. A few foals in one of the pics LRB took.
Where abouts exactley c_bowl? I ran into one on the alpine way near the ski tube turn off one night and thats it for me. Big dark shiny thing with heaps of steam coming out of the nostrels. Scared the **** out of me.
They are very bad in the dark.... horses eyes do not reflect light I remember the first time I came across a mob of brumbies on the Alpine Way one very foggy night.... just saw something on the the road ahead.... thought it was a person to start off with... then realised what it was
December a few years ago I went to park at Dead Horse Gap. There was a brumby cropping the grass which would not move to let me back the car in. Not exactly a "wild" animal I would say. That night I was camped near Cascade Hut and the brumbies kept coming up to smell the tent -- didn't get much sleep.
My first meeting with brumbies was with my pants dangling round my ankles behind a tree... I was well..doin my business and heard a boom boom boom sound comming my direction. Poked my head around the tree to see a mob of brumby's full steam ahead past my humble tree and flashiing derriere ! They then stood between me and the tent but just out of a straight line to the tent. I stood there for a good 45 mins deciding how to get back to the ten and having images of me being skittled by wild horses! Some big creatures too! Scared the poop outa me..luckily for me i was already err...well..you can guess We were at hainsworth hut as far as i can remember.
An old photo I took on the way to Cascades Hut. Pretty crappy scanned pic but the only one I've got of brumbies in KNP.
My wife and I saw 3 + 1 foal on the walking track from dead horse gap up to the rams head. on the first flat section a couple of years ago. And Ive seen them below the road between DHG and TG.
Hmph vermin, they should all be shot. [Ahem, it is pretty to see them though, like deer. Been to the Cobberas 3 or 4 times & seen brumbies every time. There's quite a few around Falls as well.]
To emphasise echidna's point take a walk through Guy Fawkes NP some time. Ridiculous numbers of brumbies in there. Makes for a restless night in the tent when mobs of 15 or so gallop past several times in the night. GFNP is where the controversy was about the brumbies being shot from helicopters.
You see em on the Bogong High Plains in Spring - pretty shy though. There's a minor industry catching them for breeding purposes.
Had a similar experience at IBend a few years back. Alone and dog-tired one evening I used Chateau Subaru rather than bother with the tent. Woken in the wee hours by soft thumps on the bodywork and 'grmf-grmf' sounds. Looked out with the Petzl to see kangaroo faces in the windows - many looking quite happy. Horn-toots made them run off, but they always returned. They were licking encrusted salt (from Kosciuszko road) off the body panels. Finally had to move the car to get rid of them. Next morning the side panels were covered in lick marks (but no teeth scratches - considerate roos).
At Dead Horse Gap. From what others have said it doesn't sound that uncommon. These ones definately didn't seem to nervous about me approaching them
one night in a national park (which shall remain nameless) with a person of my aquaintance (who shall remain nameless) I happened to look around and found an audience of kangaroos
