Fauna of Australia species are nocturnal and many arboreal. Two of the five living species of monotreme occur in Australia: the platypus and the short-beaked echidna. The monotremes differ from other mammals in their methods of reproduction; in particular, they lay eggs instead of giving birth to live young. The platypus—a venomous, egg-laying, duck-billed amphibious mammal—is considered to be one of the strangest creatures in the animal kingdom. When it was first presented by Joseph Banks to English naturalists it was thought to be so strange that it was a cleverly created hoax. The short-beaked echidna is similarly strange, covered in hairy spikes
New Guinea species with origins in Asia, together with typically Australasian flora. Typical Southern Hemisphere flora include the conifers "Podocarpus" and the rainforest emergents "Araucaria" and "Agathis," as well as tree ferns and several species of "Eucalyptus". New Guinea has 284 species and six orders of mammals: monotremes, three orders of marsupials, rodents and bats; 195 of the mammal species (69%) are endemic. New Guinea has 578 species of breeding birds, of which 324 species are endemic. The island's frogs are one of the most poorly known vertebrate groups, totalling 282 species, but this number is expected to double or even triple