The baby sugar glider weighed just 20 grams - less than two 20 cent pieces - when he dropped out of a gum tree and found himself suddenly alone in the world.
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No one knows what made his mother lose hold of him, but the theory is that she was being chased by a predator or a male sugar glider.
The baby landed on the grounds of Edmund Rice College at West Wollongong, so someone named him Eddie.
He was soon scooped up, put in a box, and handed over to WIRES Illawarra possum coordinator Tammy Lawler for months of gentle, time-consuming rearing.
Eddie takes four feeds daily and, in between, keeps his big, brown eyes mostly closed.
‘‘As long as he’s got a full tummy he’ll sleep in between the feeds because sugar gliders are nocturnal,’’ Miss Lawler said.
‘‘He’s very cute and you do fall in love with them, but it’s wrong to humanise them because they’ve got to go and live in the wild, and that’s what we’re all about.’’
Eddie will be released once he weighs at least 120 grams - about as much as two Mars bars - and can be partnered with another sugar glider and released to a colony in the wild.
Sugar gliders are reasonably common in the Illawarra but are a fairly rare visitors to WIRES, whose members encourage anyone who finds an unaccompanied infant or injured sugar glider to make contact via 1300 094 737.
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