The Lost Home Of Yellow Bellied Gliders

• Katerina Krsteski, Grade 4
• Short Story
• 2018

I opened my eyes gradually; I was wondering why there was no noise. There is always noise in a yellow bellied glider’s family. I got out of my soft, warm bed and went into the unrubbed kitchen. Not one person was there.Did you know yellow bellied gliders live in family groups? Right now, we were not in a group.

I ran outside so I could look for my family. What was I going do? I was all alone, with nothing to eat Yellow bellied gliders eat nectar, sap from eucalyptus leaves, insects, and grubs. But first, I needed to find my family! I started to run so I could look for my family rapidly. There was no sign of anyone. I went to the bush where my family loved to pick the berries. Uh! No! There was no one there. I checked everywhere I could think of………..unless I could glide above the forest to see if anyone was there. I could glide up to one hundred and forty metres high. I went to climb a tree and glide. I jumped off and started to glide, I was gliding everywhere. While I was in the air, I saw a family that looked exactly like my parents and siblings. I glided down so I could see. When I came down I ran towards them and it was them! HOORAY! HOORAY!

ZZZZZZZZZ! What was that? I turned around to have a look. It was humans. They were chopping down our tree. We had to get out of there. NOW! We all went gliding out of our tree. Yellow bellied gliders have sharp claws so we were able to climb up trees? Our yellow bellied glider family were searching and searching for a home, but we could not find one. We walked around some trees but they were already taken by other yellow bellied gliders. What were we going to do?

We looked over in the distance and saw a tree. It was empty. We went and had a look. My family and I ran towards the large tree. Finally, it had taken forever to find a home. I wondered what had happened to our old home. In our old home, Mum and Dad had separate rooms because Mum’s room was too small and Dad’s room was too small as well. Now Mum and Dad shared a room because it was big enough. My sister had her own room with a hole for a window. I had a huge room with a little pool because I think there was a flood from a rain storm. Other yellow bellied gliders probably lived here; they may have left from the rain storm.

CRASH! BANG! Not again. How many things were going to happen to us? Firstly, I couldn’t find my family! Secondly, our house was being chopped down by humans! What was going to happen next? My dad looked outside and he saw a big tractor, he told us to run outside and wait until it left. We all ran outside and waited, but it never left. It just kept going digging down. They just wanted us to be deceased. The tractor was getting closer. What were we going to do? Dad said we needed to run and find another home, but I told him to stay here because I didn’t want to keep moving around. We waited a little longer and went inside.

After a while the noise stopped. I was kind of glad and suspicious. We all looked outside for the humans; there was no sign of anyone, no humans, and no tractors. Finally we were safe.