Common wombat

The common wombat is a stocky, burrowing marsupial from south-eastern Australia and Tasmania. It is mainly active at night, eats plants, and lives in burrows it digs with strong front claws. Adults are about 75 to 120 centimetres long, and the largest weigh up to 35 kilograms.

There are three subspecies. The Bass Strait wombat lives on Flinders Island and was introduced to Maria Island; its population was estimated at 74,000 in 2023. The Tasmanian wombat is about 840,000. It is native to Australia and found nowhere else in the wild. It is a plant-eater and mainly active at night, and it is found only in Australia.

Famous cube poop

Wombats are famous for dropping cube-shaped poop. The card says they leave around a hundred pieces a night, stacking them on rocks and logs to mark territory.

Common wombats keep a home range and mostly live alone. Hackett's wombat, an extinct relative, lived in south-western Australia and died out in the Late Pleistocene. The common wombat is the only living member of its genus, Vombatus.

Pouch and burrow

As a marsupial, the baby, called a joey, lives in its mother's pouch for around five months after birth. The common wombat has a bare nose, unlike the hairy-nosed wombats.

It has thick, coarse fur from light brown to grey or black, small ears and small eyes. It sleeps in burrows by day and comes out at night to eat.

On the globe

The model shows a stocky wombat on Flinders Island in Bass Strait.