I live in Sydney, Australia. A few days ago I noticed a scene on the lawn at the back garden resembling Hollywood movies !

A possum was almost entirely devoured, except for the fur, stomach, intestines, and front half of jaws !

The kill was fresh, I noticed it early morning, no flies, and the intestines had not dried. The fur was detached from skin and left in a ring approx. 30-40 cm in diameter. The intestines and stomach were left at the middle of the ring, all positioned as they normally are inside body. The front part of jaws with teeth were within the ring. Nothing else like skin, limbs, bones, or any other organs I could find in the garden.

Several questions: What attacked the possum ? In Australia, I can not think of any predator capable of doing this. Why only fur, stomach. intestines, and part of jaws left ? A predator, this vicious is hard to imagine being so precise and choosy !

A predator this capable and precise . . . sounds more like some alien ?!

I have actually asked my kids to stay away from the garden when dark, until I find the predator.

While swimming one morning across Coogee Bay in New South Wales, we came across thousands of these strange creatures (see photo) floating at depths down to about 2 metres.

They were hard but also flexible, with water inside and a small hole at one end. Their length varied from about 3 to 30 centimetres and their walls were between 2 and 5 millimetres thick. Their skin was marked with many small protrusions, the size of which varied from one creature to another. Unlike jellyfish they appeared to be completely harmless.

No one I've spoken to from the area has ever come across anything like this. So what were they and why were they there?

Philippe Wilmotte, Maroubra, New South Wales, Australia

Some decades ago I was travelling around Australia and was lucky enough to climb Uluru. Pools on top of the rock had been produced by recent rain and, curiously, in many of them strange aquatic invertebrates were present (see photo).

This specimen is sitting in my camera lens cap, which has a diameter of 62 millimetres. It looks like an ancient trilobite. Why and how was it on top of the famous, massive rock, and what is it? What happens to the creatures when the short-lived puddles dry up?

Gavin Chester, Dwellingup, Western Australia