Annotated Guide to Australian Pokémon

In 2017, the famed Australian pixel artist Paul Robertson posted a full set of 151 “Australian Pokémon” on his Tumblr, split into five separate sets: 1-29, 30-57, 58-86, 87-111, 112-130, 131-151.

One of Paul’s most compelling qualities as an artist is his talent for allusion and analogy. Normally, his stuff centers around pop culture, but the Australian Pokémon mostly evoke Australian sociological, political, economic, and geographic themes.

It was a lot of fun researching these creatures, and I learned a lot about Australia in the process.

	#1 Gumnut A "gumnut" is a seed of the eucalyptus tree, a versatile Australian plant perhaps best known for being a favorite snack of Koala bears.
	#2 Whattle Wattle is a species of Australian flower. The Golden Wattle is the national flower of Australia.
	#3 Bankseed Banksia are another species of flower common to the country, known for their distinctive cylindrical shape.
	#4 Kickfish The following three Pokémon are based on different types of surfboards. Surfing is a popular sport on the Australian coast. Kickfish is based on a "kickboard," which is a small foam board used by children who are just learning to swim.
	#5 Boogill A middle-sized surfboard is known as a "boogie board."
	#6 Surfinn A full-sized surfboard.
	#7 Bludgie The next three are fire-type versions of Australian birds. This one's name is a combination of "budgie," a type of small bird, and "bludge" which is Australian slang for something lazy or easy.
	#8 Flamingalaa This one's a galah, a type of pink bird. The phrase "Ya flamin' galah!" is a catch-phrase associated with the actor Alf Stewart in the long-running Aussie soap opera, "Home And Away."
	#9 Cockatwo A two-headed cockatoo, one of Australia's most famous bird breeds.
	#10 Stubbee A short, 12-oz bottle of beer is nicknamed a "stubby" in Australian slang. This one is sitting in a rubber "stubby holder."
	#11 Longnecc A standard-sized bottle of beer is nicknamed a "longneck." Australians like their beer.
	#12 Shooga A piece of sugar cane, one of Australia's main crops.
	#13 Caynbeatel Cane beetles are one of the great scourges of Australian agriculture.
	#14 Canetode Eventually the cane beetles got so bad the Australians imported beetle-eating toads from South America to take care of them. Unfortunately, the toads multiplied out of control and became a major pest in their own right. This is what that one episode of The Simpsons was parodying.
	#15 Sprinkles This guy is supposed to be a slice of "fairy bread," which is a sweet snack Australians make out of bread, butter, and special round sprinkles they call "hundreds and thousands."
	#16 Lamintonne This one's a Lamington, a kind of chocolate cake covered in coconut shavings.
	#17 Pavlover A Pavlova is a cake made of meringue filled with fruit.
	#18 Swagtail As in America, in Australia "swag" is slang for bling, or money. This Pokémon is also based on a bird known as a wagtail.
	#19 Tucker There's a famous 19th century Australian poem called Bullocky Bill (1857) that contains the iconic line "the dog sat on the Tucker Box/Nine miles from Gundagai." It evokes a romantic image of a loyal dog of an early Australian pioneer patiently guarding his master's lunchbox ("tucker box") back at camp while the master goes off to have adventures — and possibly never return. The city of Gundagai has a famous statue of a dog on a tucker box, in reference to the poem, which is what this Pokémon is specifically based on.
	#20 Criccet Australia is one of the corners of the former British Empire where cricket is still a popular sport. This guy is a cricket ball.
	#21 Footee Australians have their own version of American football, called "Australian rules football," also known as AFL, after the Australian Football League, or "footy" It uses a distinctive red ball.
	#22 Whooroo These two Pokémon are based on kangaroos, a famous Australian animal I hope we're all familiar with already. This one's name also makes reference to the phrase "hooroo" which is slang for "see ya!"
	#23 Tworoo
	#24 Roll Australians are fond of eating short, stubby sausage rolls.
	#25 Rolls
	#26 Rollss Ketchup is the traditional roll sauce.
	#27 Yoyou Yo-Yos are a traditional Australian sweet made from two fat cookies with cream sandwiched in between.
	#28 Timm Tamm "Tim Tams" are Australia's most famous brand of chocolate cookie.
	#29 Aarnott Arnott's is Australia's main cookie company. They make Tim Tams, among others. This guy looks to be a box of Arnott's "assorted cream" cookies come to life.
	#30 Aayers One of Australia's most famous natural landmarks is Ayers Rock, named after the Australian statesman Sir Henry Ayers (1821-1897). It's a huge sandstone monolith located in the middle of the continent.
	#31 Uuluuruu Ayers Rock is also a sacred site to the indigenous peoples of the area, and in recent years there's been a growing movement to refer to it by its original aboriginal name, Uluru.
	#32 Sweetsail Australia is home to a variety of flying possums who leap from tree to tree using fleshy "wings" under their arms. One is breed is known as the sugartail, because their long coiled tail resembles a lollypop.
	#33 Brushsail Another breed, with a particularly bushy tail, is known as the bushtail possum....
	#34 Ringsail ...and the ringtail possum, which also has a coily tail.
	#35 Tommi The next three Pokémon all involve ketchup, which is a very popular sauce in Australia. The first one has the name "tommy," a slang term for it.
	#36 Whycrow White Crow is a popular Australian ketchup brand.
	#37 Dedorse The working-class British tradition of rhyming slang caught on to some extent among Australians. "Dead horse" is rhyming slang for "tomato sauce." You have to remember that the Australians have strong accents and pronounce it to-mah-to.
	#38 Parteepye Another popular Australian foodstuff: meat pies, which come in a number of different sizes. Little ones are known as "party pies."
	#39 Forntwennee The main Australian meat pie company is called "Four'n Twenty."
	#40 Corker Australia produces a lot of cork, which comes from the northern Australian corkwood tree. "Corker" is also Australian slang for "something good."
	#41 Akobra This cobra-looking Pokemon has a hood resembling the famous Australian cork hat, which is a wide hat with corks on strings dangling from the brim. In the old days, pioneers wore hats like these to keep bugs out of their face, but today it's simply become a cliché of a stereotypical "outback" guy. The name "Akobra" refers to Akubra, an Australian hat company.
	#42 Ozzee One of Australia's most beloved long-running TV shows was a musical variety show called Hey Hey, it's Saturday! which ran from 1971 to 1999. Two of its hosts were people in duck costumes, one of whom was named Ossie Ostrich.
	#43 Plucca Ossie Ostrich's costumed co-star was named Plucka Duck.
	#44 Bayle These three are all pieces of a cricket wicket, which is the thing the cricket batter (batsman) tries to prevent from being knocked over by the pitcher (bowler). The bails are two small wooden pieces that rest on the stumps.
	#45 Stuump A cricket wicket consists of three stumps, which are spiked posts inserted into the ground.
	#46 Wicketts This guy is based on a fully assembled wicket. You can see he's three stumps with two bails on top.
	#47 Dimee A lot of popular Australian food has Asian influence. Dimees are little deep-fried Chinese vegetable dumplings. The full name is a "dim sim," not to be confused with "Dim Sum."
	#48 Chicko Spring rolls are another popular Asian-inspired Australian snack. They're usually called Chiko Rolls, after the Chiko corporation that produces the most popular kind.
	#49 Slipp In the 1980s Australians grew up watching a popular sun cancer awareness ad campaign featuring a cartoon bird named Sid Seagull singing a reminder to always "slip, slop, slap" before heading outside in the sun. The idea was to slip on a shirt, slop on some sunscreen, and slap on a hat. The success of the campaign saw it spread to the United States and Canada.
	#50 Slopp
	#51 Slapp
	#52 Bunning Bunnings is a popular chain of Australian hardware store.
	#53 Maasterr Masters was another popular hardware store chain. It went out of business in 2016. It's a bit odd that Paul Robertson named the bigger of his two hardware-themed Pokémon after Masters, given Bunnings was always the more powerful of the two chains.
	#54 Peggo Three Pokémon based on air-drying clothes, which is popular practice in the warm Australian climate. This one is just a simple wood clothespin.
	#55 Line A clothesline.
	#56 Hoyst A "hoist" style clothesline is a post with four foldable prongs connected by wires, creating a large, umbrella-like structure to hang many articles of clothing on.
	#57 Bogg "Bog" is an Australian slang term meaning "crap" or "shit" (either noun or verb).
	#58 Shitta Calling the toilet the "shitter" is common in Australia, as in America.
	#59 Dunnee "Dunny" is Australian slang for "outhouse."
	#60 Balo Australia is known for its high-quality wool, shorn from its large population of sheep and goats.
	#61 Curls Probably a reference to curly mohair wool, which comes from angora goats — plentiful in Australia.
	#62 Woolees "Woolies" is a chain of Australian supermarkets. This Pokémon's tail resembles their logo.
	#63 Veebee This guy is a can of Victoria Bitter (VB) beer. You can tell because of the distinctive green label with a red logo.
	#64 Sixpacc A six pack of beer.
	#65 Slaabb Australians call a box of 24 beers a "slab."
	#66 Stoney An Australian stone fish, nicknamed a "stoney."
	#67 Toadey An Australian toad fish, nicknamed a "toady." The appearance of this specific fish is based on a character named Toadfish "Toadie" Rebecchi, on the Australian soap opera Neighbours. His brother on the series is named Stonefish Rebecchi.
	#68 Dampa This guy is a loaf of damper, a dense type of bread made by early Australian pioneers — and still enjoyed today.
	#69 Ocker These next three Pokémon are personifications of various Australian insults for dumb, hickish people. First is "ocker."
	#70 Drongo Next is "drongo." Note the mullet.
	#71 Bogaan And last is "bogan," which refers to a particular sort of stupid lower-class slob, comparable to what we might call "white trash" or "redneck" in America.
	#72 Mozzee A "mozzie" is Australian slang for mosquito, which the country has a lot of. Better wear a cork hat!
	#73 Blowee A "blowie" is a blow fly, also known as a bluebottle fly, which is another irritating Australian insect.
	#74 Grabby This guy is one of Australia's famous blue lobsters.
	#75 Platterpuss This one is just a play on the name "platypus," one of Australia's most famous weird animals. It's not actually a cat with a platter, of course.
	#76 Snagg "Snag" is slang for sausage. Australians like to grill them on the barbecue.
	#77 Chopper A "chopper" is a pork chop, also popular with the grill set.
	#78 Barbee This Pokémon embodies perhaps the most famous Australian slang term of them all — "barbie," meaning barbecue.
	#79 Bindee From the everything-in-Australia-is-trying-to-kill-you file, "bindis" are sharp, thorny weeds that grow in the grass, threatening the barefoot.
	#80 Errwinn This one is based on Steve Irwin (1962-2006), the eccentric host of the popular Australian nature show The Crocodile Hunter. In 2006 Irwin was killed when a stingray stabbed him in the chest with its poison tail. There's also an Irwin connection to the Pokemon above: Steve's daughter (and frequent co-star) was named "Bindi."
	#81 Cassowar These two Pokémon are based on the cassowary, one of Australia's many species of giant land bird.
	#82 Cassowarrior
	#83 Quokkadile A quokka is another one of Australia's many strange pouched mammals, and has been likened to a large, cheerful rat. This Pokemon's name is a combination of "quokka" and "crocodile," crocs being another common Australian beast.
	#84 Pann Australia experienced a gold rush in the mid-19th century that played an important role in the country's history, helping swell the population and grow the economy. These two Pokémon are nuggets of gold in gold pans, which was a tool prospectors used to find gold in rivers.
	#85 Nuggett
	#86 Boomer These two are based on the boomerang, which is of course the famous Australian throwing weapon first devised by the country's aboriginal peoples.
	#87 Ranga A red-haired person is often insultingly called a "ranga" in Australian slang, after an orangutan.
	#88 Kaboomerang
	#89 Theraynsarere This guy's name — which sounds like "the rains are here" — is a reference to a famous 90s-era Australian commercial for pre-packaged corn on the cob. The main character's catch phrase "Marge, the rains are here!" has since become a big meme in Australian internet culture.
	#90 Fucnoath The next three guys are all personifications of Australian slang expressions. This one is "fucking oath!" which means "you got that right!"
	#91 Bludioath This one is "bloody oath!," a less profane way of saying "fucking oath!"
	#92 Getfuctcnt This one should be pretty self-evident if you read his name out loud.
	#93 Harbor Two Pokémon based on famous Australian bridges. The Harbor Bridge in Sydney...
	#94 Westgate ...and the West Gate Bridge in Melbourne.
	#95 Caramell The Cadbury candy company produces two animal-shaped chocolate sweets popular with Australian children. One is called Caramello Koala...
	#96 Fredo ...the other is Freddo Frog.
	#97 Berty There's also a third knock-off chocolate character produced by the rival Nestlé candy company called Bertie Beetle.
	#98 Crookaburra This guy's name is a combination of "crook" and kookaburra, one of Australia's most iconic birds.
	#99 Corobberbee The name of this one is a combination of "bee" (an insect Australia has a lot of) and "Corroboree," which is both an aboriginal ceremony and a type of black-and-yellow poisonous frog. In this case, the name doesn't seem to have much to do with the character and is just a visual pun.
	#100 Corale The next three allude to scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef, the largest and most beautiful coral reef in the world — and one of Australia's most famous tourist attractions.
	#101 Scooba
	#102 Reeef
	#103 Speedo The tiny and tight Speedo brand bathing suit is popular among the Australian beach-going set, although I suppose that's true of a lot of places.
	#104 Stubbs In addition to being a nickname for a small bottle of beer (see #10 above) Stubbies is also the brand name of a popular type of very short shorts that young Australian men like to wear.
	#105 Trackees "Trackies" is Australian slang for sweat pants.
	#106 Lilbute A "ute" in Australian slang is a pickup truck. The name of this guy is a pun because he's both a lil' ute and a lil' "beaut," which is Australian slang for something beautiful.
	#107 Yoobute Here is a huge ute. "You beaut" is Australian slang for something cool.
	#108 Elekidna An electric-type pun on "echidna," the Australian spiny anteater.
	#109 Eleckidyeah
	#110 Vegemite Perhaps Australia's best-known food, Vegemite is a yeast paste eaten on toast. It's not actually made of vegetables.
	#111 Billy "Billy" is Australian slang for a metal pot or can. Shooting them is a popular form of target practice in the outback.
	#112 Dedkellee Ned Kelly (1855-1880) was a famous Australian outlaw who terrorized the countryside with his gang of thieves before being caught and executed. He wore crude metal armor much like this Pokémon. "Dead Kelly," meanwhile, is an Australian heavy metal band. They're known for their unapologetic embrace of bogan culture (see #72 above), which are the same sort of people likely to enjoy shooting cans.
	#113 Ranger This guy's name is meant to evoke the idea of a "bushranger," who were the sort of bandit underclass of early Australia, either descendent from, or literally exiled British convicts.
	#114 Loonaparc This guy resembles Luna Bob, the rather grotesque mascot of Sydney's Luna Park amusement park. The park's entranceway takes the form of his giant open mouth.
	#115 Spithedummy The next two Pokémon are personified versions of Australian slang expressions meaning "to throw a tantrum." This one's "spit the dummy." "Dummy" is the Australian term for a baby's pacifier.
	#116 Chuckawobbly This one is "chuck a wobbly." "Chuck" basically means "throw" (as in, throw a tantrum) while "wobbly" means "fuss."
	#117 Fongg A thong-style sandal, popular with beach-going Australians.
	#118 Sandell A normal sandal.
	#119 Blunstonn This one is based on a Blundstone boot, from the famous Australian footwear company.
	#120 Chillby These next three Pokémon are all ice-type bilbies, which is a type of Australian bandicoot.
	#121 Billbyte
	#122 Billblizzard
	#123 Goonfish Australians love their wine, and "goon" is slang for an aluminum bag of cheap wine, popular with lower-class types.
	#124 Caskfish A "cask" is the cardboard box the goon comes in.
	#125 Dinglow Three ghost-type takes on the dingo, the famous baby-eating species of wild Australian dog.
	#126 Dinghost
	#127 Djinngo This one's name refers to a "djinn" which an Arabic term for ghost.
	#128 Combat Two fighting-type wombats, a bear-like Australian marsupial.
	#129 Wombash
	#130 Eemuu These four Pokemon are just pun versions of the emu, the largest Australian land bird.
	#131 Treemuu
	#132 Seamuu
	#133 Steamuu
	#134 Gootongue Australia is home to more lizards than anywhere else on earth. This Pokémon is a take on the Australian "blue tongue," a mid-sized lizard with a vibrant blue tongue.
	#135 Gooko A gecko, a small, sticky-footed species of lizard.
	#136 Gooanna This one is a gooey version of the Australian goanna, an enormous family of monitor lizard that can grow to over six feet long.
	#137 Didjitygrub These two creatures are based on the didgeridoo, a long, horn-like instrument played by Australia's aboriginal peoples. This one is a combination of a didgeridoo and a witchetty grub, which is a fat Australian caterpillar.
	#138 Didgeridoom
	#139 Sidnee The next four Pokémon are all references to notable places in Australia. This one refers to Sydney, Australia's largest city and home of the iconic, shell-like Sydney Opera House.
	#140 Melbonn Melbourne is Australia's second-largest city. This guy resembles the Flinders Street Station, one of the city's iconic landmarks.
	#141 Paradyse This guy is a reference to Surfer's Paradise Beach, a beach in Queensland known for being, well...
	#142 Golcoast Gold Coast is a large coastal city in Queensland known for being the home of Surfer's Paradise Beach, among other things. Humpback whale watching is a popular tourist attraction.
	#143 Bunyeep The bunyip is a mythical creature from Australian folklore. Said to have a furry, lizardlike body and a giant mouth full of sharp teeth.
	#144 yowee Yowie is the name of the Australian bigfoot.
	#145 Rainboa The rainbow serpent, or rainbow snake, is an important godlike creature in Australian aboriginal mythology.
	#146 Big O A few lesser-known cities in Australia built giant fruit sculptures to drum up tourism. This Pokemon is based on the Big Orange of Berri, South Australia.
	#147 Big B This one is based on the Big Banana of Coffs Harbour, New South Wales.
	#148 Big P This one is the Big Pineapple of Woombye, Queensland.
	#149 Blaccbox "Black box" technology, which is used to record and preserve the final moments of a crashed airplane, was invented by the Australian scientist David Warren (1925-2010).
	#150 Wifly The technology behind wireless internet connection technology, or Wi-Fi, was first developed by the Australian government's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).