Woodward S Wallaroo

About the Woodward S Wallaroo

The black wallaroo (Osphranter bernardus), also known as Woodward's wallaroo, is a species of macropod restricted to a small, mountainous area in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia, between South Alligator River and Nabarlek. It classified as near threatened, mostly due to its limited distribution. A large proportion of the range is protected by Kakadu National Park.

The description of the species was published by Walter Rothschild in 1904. The author initially assigned the species to a new genus as Dendrodorcopsis woodwardi, but revision of new material forwarded to England by the collector John Tunney persuaded the mammalogist Oldfield Thomas that the characteristics of the taxon were assignable to Macropus.

The specific epithet woodwardi was preoccupied by another subspecies of the genus (Macropus robustus woodwardi), prompting Rothschild to assign the new epithet bernardus. In 2019, a reassessment of macropod taxonomy determined that the species should be moved from the genus Macropus to the genus Osphranter. This change was accepted by the Australian Faunal Directory in 2020.

Other common names of O. bernardus also include black kangaroo, northern black wallaroo... Wikipedia →