Fall City ranch offers a local down under experience
Published 10:23 am Thursday, October 2, 2008
Snow, an 8-month-old albino wallaby, loves to grab the newspaper off a low table and run around Rex Paperd’s house with it. Ten-month-old Veronica also likes to run around the house, when she is not curled up inside a carrier that often hangs from a nearby stroller.
Caring for them can be a challenge, but the affection he feels for the wallabies makes time spent training and giving them proper attention all seem worthwhile, said Paperd, who runs the Fall City Wallaby Ranch on the Paperd property in Fall City.
When he and his wife Tawny decided to get a new pet four years ago, they originally wanted a skunk. In addition to a dog, they already had an iguana and two tarantulas.
“But [with the exception of the dog] they’re not exactly warm and fuzzy,” Rex said.
After finding that having a skunk as a pet wouldn’t work out for legal reasons, he and his wife took a look at wallabies.
“It’s a different kind of pet,” Paperd said. “But certainly our family was on board with it.”
“It just came to be an option and we looked at different warm and fuzzies and when we saw a wallaby, that’s all it took,” Rex said.
They purchased a baby Bennetts wallaby they named Victoria’s Secret and so began a love affair with wallabies that led the Paperds to create the Fall City Wallaby Ranch four years ago; a 14-acre spread of property along Fish Hatchery Road in Fall City.
Open to the public, the ranch offers private and group tours, educational lectures and personal appearances.
“Our animals are mostly petting-zoo trained,” said Rex, who has raised most of the animals on the ranch himself, including 12 wallabies (at least one of which is pregnant), one 20-month-old red kangaroo named Rocky (who is also trained to work with the hearing impaired) and one wallaroo named Mickey Mouse; a separate breed, not a hybrid of a wallaby or a kangaroo.
Natives to Australia and Tasmania, wallabies are marsupials, a type of mammal that holds and cares for its young in a pouch on the mother’s abdomen. There are about 50 species of kangaroos and wallabies; Bennetts are one of two types of wallabies traditionally used as exotic pets because of their easy-going temperaments.
“The truth is that within 30 days of the time we got our first wallaby, we recognized the magic,” Rex said. “The minute you hold or interact or simply see it, the response to this incredibly emotional animal is immediate.”
The Paperd’s sell wallabies as pets for $1,200-$3,000 (though Veronica and Snow are not for sale).
“What we want are people who have a commitment or who are ready for a commitment to being surrogate parents and not [just] pet owners,” he said. “We’re looking for people who want to adopt a baby.”
Taken from their mother at about eight months, baby wallabies are entirely dependent on others for support for the first year or so of their lives, Rex said, describing them as needing “infant-like attention.”
Able to jump up to 4 feet in adulthood, wallabies can reach 2 1/2 to 3 feet tall and grow to weigh 35-44 pounds. They can live 12-15 years.
They eat grass, maple branches and special feed, but their favorite human food, given as treats, are cashews.
Though the Paperds had no professional experience with animals prior to their first wallaby purchase (Rex is a retired entrepreneur and Tawny works at the Salish Lodge & Spa), Rex said they have learned much along the way.
Along with the animals and Tawny, the Paperd household includes his father, Paul, who lives downstairs and two children, one 17-year-old son and one 15-year-old daughter.
“It’s just a passion,” Rex said, noting that he gets a special joy from introducing a wallaby to those who have not previously interacted with one. “The hardest thing is stopping at just one or two.”
A Detroit native, Rex has lived in the Seattle area since 1979; he and Tawny have lived in Fall City for eight years.
Looking to share the love he feels for his wallabies with those in his community, Rex takes them to nursing homes, brings them to school assemblies and recently donated his time for a fund-raising photo opportunity at the Sno Falls Credit Union to benefit the American Cancer Society’s Snoqualmie Valley Relay for Life.
“That’s a special gift, to give back,” Rex said. “There is good and bad in this world and you get back one-hundred fold what you put in … the best thing about having them is having such an incredible quality to share.”
Selling about six wallabies a year, Rex said the last client to whom he sold a wallaby noted that having it was the “most incredible animal-parenting experience.”
“It’s the most incredible bonding experience you could ever have,” Rex added.
The Fall City Wallaby Ranch is located at 35327 S.E. Fish Hatchery Road in Fall City. The ranch’s Web site, www.fallcitywallabyranch.com, will be accessible soon. For immediate information, call (425) 222-3819 or e-mail rexandtawny@comcast.net.
