It was a still night in the Harry Waring Marsupial Reserve, a 30-minute drive south of the Perth CBD. The reserve was thick with scrub, and there weren’t many clouds, making the night fairly cold. It was probably 17 degrees, but that is jumper-and-jacket weather by Western Australian standards. I was at the reserve to learn about marsupial tagging and trapping. We spent hour after hour fighting through the scrub, and as someone who has an incredible ability to fall over, I was doing everything in my power to stay on both feet. The night passed monotonously by setting traps, checking traps, finding animals in said traps, and taking measurements of the wondrous nocturnal animals lured in by a sludgy mix of peanut butter and oats. When moving around the reserve, I was told to remain as quiet as possible. I instinctively thought this was not to scare animals away from the traps, but who am I kidding, peanut butter would lure anything in. Remaining quiet was not a request; it was a necessity. If I was too loud, a female awaiting extraction from a trap might perform her own abortion and throw her baby at you.

Recent events have shown the world that women’s healthcare will forever be threatened because abortion is ‘unnatural’. But many of our Aussie animals would beg to differ; they are aborting left, right and centre.