Sydney people are accustomed to living with wild animals. Possums take up residence in attics and have to be trapped or chased away. Gardeners shake out their boots in case snakes or spiders should be lurking inside.
A few weeks ago, in a country town, I picked up an electric torch on my way out to dinner at the local pub. Crouched beside the on/off button, just where I was about to stick my thumb, crouched a redback spider. A bite from it - as the engrossingly morbid book Australia's Most Dangerous tells me - would have caused 'sweating, stiffness, muscle weakness and tremors'. (No deaths from the species have been recorded since 1956, when an antivenom was developed).
But, despite their familiarity with wild creatures, there was some alarm among Sydneysiders when they were informed that more than 6,000 animals - some highly venomous - were to take up residence at a mini-zoo in the very heart of the city. The Sydney Wildlife World will open in September in Darling Harbour, a slickly developed former industrial area just a few hundred metres from the city centre. The zoo's giant, wire-mesh structure has sprouted up on a dusty building site beside the Sydney Aquarium. Wildlife World will be home to a wide range of native Australian animals, from the ever-popular koalas to echidnas (an Antipodean anteater that resembles a hedgehog).
The creatures will live in nine separate ecosystems including a miniature rainforest, a desert habitat and a rocky escarpment that will be home to a band of rare, yellow-footed rock wallabies. There will be interpretative signs in English, Chinese, Korean and Japanese.
A two-storey aviary and miniature forest will provide a habitat for butterflies and birds. Visitors will be able to observe possums and quolls, a sort of marsupial cat, in the nocturnal house. 'Australia's a bit like the Galapagos Islands - we're so isolated that we have some very unique animals,' said marketing director Ravini Perera.
Of Australia's 10 most venomous snake species, six will be taking up residence at Sydney Wildlife World, including the taipan, which can grow to a length of four metres.
