Wild kangaroos tend to favour their left hands during common tasks like grooming and feeding, a study suggests.
The researchers say this is the first demonstration of population-level "handedness" in a species other than humans, who are mostly right-handed.
The evidence comes from hours spent observing multiple species in the wild.
Two species of roo and one wallaby all showed the left-handed trend; some other marsupials, which walk on all fours, did not show the same bias.
The research, published in the journal Current Biology, was conducted by Russian scientists from St Petersburg State University, who travelled to Australia to do the fieldwork. There they collaborated with Janeane Ingram, a wildlife ecologist and PhD student at the University of Tasmania.
Ms Ingram told the BBC the work had faced some scepticism.
"Unfortunately, even my own colleagues think that studying left-handedmacropods is not a serious issue, but any study that proves true handedness in another bipedal species contributes to the study of brain symmetry and mammalian evolution," she said.READ MORE -http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-33169547
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