Tasmanian Wildlife by Richard Newton

"My uncle...now there's a story," says Bernard Atkins, tramping across a sloping field in twilight. "He picked up a platypus and whammo: dose of venom in the hand. He was crook for months. Nearly died twice." With that, we reach the edge of a mirror-calm dam. We've come to see platypuses.

This is one of three dams on a farm near the coastal village of Stanley in northern Tasmania. They each support a pair of wild platypuses, so Bernard fancies our chances of a sighting. "Seen 'em 121 nights running," he says. Within a couple of minutes, he makes it 122.

A U-shaped wake is the first indication. Through binoculars, I decipher the unmistakable form of one of the world's strangest animals. From the tip of its rubbery duck-bill to the end of its blunt tail it is no more than 50cm long.

It paddles along the surface for thirty seconds, then dives to trawl the muddy bottom for worms and aquatic insects. When it bobs back to view, I track it as it navigates in purposeful circles. "Females swim straight, so that's a male," Bernard reckons in a whisper. "He's checking us out."

Only the males are venomous, purely for defence, and inject the poison through 1.5cm spurs on their hind legs. The chemistry of the venom has only recently been studied, revealing that it directly attacks the victim's pain cells. "My uncle said it was bloody excruciating," Bernard affirms. Ironically, further research could lead to the development of a potent new painkiller.

"Incredible little blighters, aren't they?" he says. I nod. We haven't even touched upon the fact that they are monotremes - primitive mammals that lay eggs.

Eventually the female surfaces. We watch the pair of them until the warm summer evening cedes to darkness. We pick our way through long grass back to the car by torchlight.

I reach Hanlon House, my comfortable bed and breakfast accommodation in Stanley, after ten o'clock. Still feeling the impact of my long flight from London, I am keen to turn in, but my host, Graham Wells, has other ideas. "We should walk down to the beach to check out the action," he suggests. It turns out that he has a particular fondness for penguins, and has taken it upon himself to create a rookery for them.

When we reach the waterline, the full moon has risen, casting steely light over the boulders that Graham has strategically positioned along the shore. Tiny fairy penguins body-surf onto the beach, struggle to their feet, and waddle up to their custom-made nesting shelters.

"They used to nest under the houses in the village. Some still do, but by encouraging them to stay on this side of the road we've reduced the number of roadkills," he says. "The colony has grown as a result. How many can you see now? Thirty? That's only a small proportion."

Above us looms the eerie silhouette of the Nut, the 152-metre flat-topped hill that forms a stunning headland immediately beside the village. In the morning, I get to see the Nut from the ocean side as I voyage along the coast in a small fishing boat captained by Darryl Stafford. "It's actually a volcanic monolith," he tells me as we gaze up at the sheer bluestone cliffs.

Chugging along in the Nut's shadow, we are sheltered from the wind. When we move into exposed water, we pitch and yaw in a two-and-a-half-metre swell. "Not to worry," Darryl says, patting the wooden rail of his trusty vessel. "She'll take three metres."

Our destination is an island of slick rocks currently being battered by splintering waves. On closer inspection, I see that some of the rocks are moving. "They're what we've come to see," Darryl shouts above the thunder of the breakers. "Australian fur seals. World's fourth rarest seal species."

With the boat rocking violently in the heaving water, Darryl steers as close to the rocks as he dares. Most of the seals are basking in the sun, but two dozen are in the water, swimming adroitly through the turbulence. I try to forget that their main enemy - often found close to the rookeries - is the great white shark.

"I've never seen a great white," Darryl assures me. "But don't go dipping your arm in the water, just in case."

On the return voyage I keep my gaze fixed on the horizon. The southern coast of Australia lies 240km in that direction, separated from Tasmania by the treacherous Bass Strait.

Until the end of the Ice Age, 13,000 years ago, Tasmania was connected to the mainland by a land bridge. When rising seas severed the link, a wide range of wildlife was left stranded on the newly-created island. The benefit of this circumstance was truly realised when Europeans arrived in Australia. Within decades, the native animals on the mainland had been decimated, yet many of their Tasmanian cousins survived.

"Tassie's a bit of an Ark, I reckon," says Androo Kelly of Trowunna Wildlife Park, a 15-hectare sanctuary set in bushland west of Launceston. Standing under a eucalyptus tree, we are looking up at a koala. "These fellas aren't native to Tasmania, but the population over in South Australia has been badly hit by chlamydia. Here in the sanctuary we've established a disease-free group."

The majority of the other sanctuary residents are indigenous Tasmanian species, mostly rescue cases. Although the ecology of this island has been seriously depleted since the arrival of humans, it has fared much better than the Australian mainland.

Tasmania was the last refuge for two large marsupial carnivores. The collie-sized thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger, has probably fallen to extinction in recent decades (there are still occasional reports of sightings, but no confirmed evidence), while the Tasmanian devil remains widespread.

After leading me to an enclosure full of truculent devils, Androo reaches over the wall and pulls one out by the scruff of the neck. Its initial hisses of displeasure subside to contented silence. For all their huff and puff, and pitbull looks, they turn out to be softies.

Around us, free-ranging mobs of Forester kangaroos and Bennett's wallabies roam between the various animal pens. They aren't the only ones with the run of the place. Later, as we chat in his office, Androo suddenly notices movement in the scrub outside.

"You little beauty!" he says, dashing from the room. Seconds later I see him through the window frenetically running this way and that. Finally he launches himself into a flying rugby tackle and vanishes from view. He reappears cradling a hefty wombat.

"She accidentally burrowed her way out last week," he explains as we escort the bewildered marsupial back to her enclosure. "You couldn't stay away long, though, you great mutt. Let's get you home."

From Trowunna I head north, leaving behind the forested hills of the interior to traverse an expanse of rolling countryside strikingly reminiscent of England. Some of the names have a familiar ring, though in the transference Down Under they have been appropriated haphazardly: I drive from Chudleigh, via Sheffield, to Devonport, at the mouth of the River Mersey.

These echoes of a distant homeland were undoubtedly an attraction for H.W. Houghton, an English colonel who settled on the northern coast in 1948. He purchased Hawley House, a dilapidated property overlooking an estuary, and set about renovating it.

"For the rest of his life the house was maintained as a far-flung outpost of the British Empire," says Simon Houghton, the colonel's son. "My father always cast himself as the archetypal English gentleman, though he was probably illegitimate, because we never met any of his family. I expect that's why he ended up here."

When Simon inherited the estate in the 1980s, he realised that he would have to make it pay its way. The house was converted to a bed and breakfast, and 8 hectares of the grounds were planted as a vineyard. As a finishing touch, he installed a bathtub on the roof. Guests have the option of bathing under the stars (though they must brave the aggressive pet cockatoo living beside it).

Animals are an integral part of the Houghton household. Along with a menagerie of pets, including Alsatians, horses, ferrets, and the irascible cockatoo, significant chunks of the sprawling estate have been set aside for wild reptiles and amphibians. On a morning walk through the bushland at the back of the house, Simon halts me with a brusque grip on my collar. Something rustles in the grass ahead. "You almost stepped on a tiger snake there, mate," he says without drama.

Returning from our stroll, we pass Simon's private church, built on the fringe of the formal gardens. "This was an afterthought," he says. "After we restored the gardens and set up ponds for endangered native frogs, I felt something was missing. A church, I reckoned, was just what we needed."

Luckily there was one up for sale near Stanley. St George's was a prefab wooden church shipped out from England in 1878 at a cost, then, of £188. With approval from the parishoners, Simon bought it in 1999, trucked it along the coast, and reassembled it here.

"My personal beliefs lean towards Buddhism," he tells me as we stand beside the altar with his three dogs lying around us. "I believe all forms of life are equally valid. So when we had the church formally consecrated we called it 'All Creatures'. Our non-human friends were invited to the service. Luckily, none of them ate each other."

Later, I visit the church alone with a bottle of local Cascade lager in hand. I skirt past the family of ducks milling about in the vestibule and sit down on the altar step for a few moments of quiet contemplation.

I take a swig and gaze absently at the bottle's label, which depicts a pair of thylacines. It would be easy to dwell on the animals that Tasmania has lost, but I prefer to give thanks for what remains.