Animal
Common wombat
The common wombat is a round, furry digger. It lives in burrows in the ground in Australia and comes out at night to eat grass.
The common wombat, or bare-nosed wombat, is a stocky, barrel-shaped marsupial of south-eastern Australia and Tasmania. It is one of the world's largest burrowing animals, spends about two thirds of its life underground and leaves cube-shaped poop to mark its patch.
Vombatus ursinus is a grazing, burrowing marsupial of south-eastern Australia and Tasmania, with ever-growing teeth and one of the lowest metabolic rates known for a mammal over 10 kilograms. The IUCN assessed it as Least Concern in 2024, with 1 to 2 million mature individuals, though sarcoptic mange causes severe local declines.
Photo: Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Meet the common wombat
The common wombat is a big, round, furry animal.
It has short legs, a wide head and a bare nose. It is a super digger. Mother wombats carry their babies in a pouch.
The common wombat is a marsupial, so its baby grows up in a pouch. It is also called the bare-nosed wombat, because its large nose has no fur on it. Wombats are short, stocky and shaped a little like a barrel, with a broad head, small eyes, short rounded ears and powerful shoulders. The tail is tiny and hidden in the fur.
A mainland wombat is about 98 centimeters long and weighs about 26 kilograms on average. Wombats in Tasmania and on islands are smaller.
Vombatus ursinus, the bare-nosed or common wombat, is a stocky marsupial built for burrowing: broad head, small eyes, short strong neck, powerful shoulders and limbs, short broad feet with flattened claws, and a tail of about 25 millimeters hidden by fur. The coarse coat ranges from glossy black, gray and chocolate brown to sandy and cream, and may be stained by soil.
The Australian Museum gives mainland adults an average head-and-body length of 985 millimeters (840 to 1,150) and a weight of 26 kilograms (22 to 39); Tasmanian and island wombats are smaller, and females tend to be slightly larger than males of the same age.
Quick facts
- Group
- Mammal
- Length
- 0.84 to 1.15 m
- Weight
- 22 to 39 kg
- Lifespan in the wild
- up to 15 years
Where it lives
Common wombats live in Australia.
They live in the south-east and on the island of Tasmania. They dig burrows in forests, hills and mountains.
Common wombats live in south-eastern Australia, from south-east Queensland to south-east South Australia, in Tasmania and on a few islands in Bass Strait, such as Flinders Island. They live from sea level high into the mountains, up to about 2,200 meters.
Most live in cool forests, but in South Australia and Tasmania they also live in woodland, coastal scrub and heath. They like to dig their burrows on slopes above creeks and gullies and feed in nearby grassy clearings. They have disappeared from many places where they lived 200 years ago.
The IUCN describes a discontinuous, fragmented range from south-eastern Queensland to south-eastern South Australia, plus mainland Tasmania and Flinders, Bruny, Dog, King, Rigby, Snake, Sunday and Rotamah islands, from sea level to 2,200 meters; the Cape Barren and Clarke Island populations have been lost, and wombats were introduced to Maria Island in the 1960s.
In southern Queensland and northern New South Wales the species lives only in sclerophyll forest above 600 meters, but farther south it also uses woodland, coastal scrub and heath. The Australian Museum notes it has almost vanished from western Victoria and much of its former New South Wales range since European settlement.
Continent
Its habitats
Where can you find this animal?
- Lives here naturally · Countries and seas named by a scientific source
- Sightings recorded · Records of wild sightings (GBIF)
Lives here naturally · Countries and seas named by a scientific source
Fragmented range in south-eastern Australia, from south-east Queensland to south-east South Australia, plus Tasmania and several Bass Strait islands; introduced to Maria Island in the 1960s.
Places: Australia.
Source: iucn-red-list · checked October 2026
Sightings recorded · Records of wild sightings (GBIF)
Counts of GBIF records of wild observations (human and machine) and preserved specimens. Records include introduced populations, vagrants, escaped or released animals and misidentifications, so a country with records is not necessarily part of the native range.
Wild sightings have been recorded in Australia, United States and Japan.
Source: gbif · checked October 2026
Range maps show where scientists say an animal lives, often country by country. An animal may live in only part of a country shown, and sightings records can include animals that wandered far from home.
What it eats
Wombats eat grass.
They munch for hours at night. Their teeth never stop growing.
Wombats are grazers. Their main food is tough native grasses, plus plants called sedges and rushes. They especially like tussock grass in forests and kangaroo grass and wallaby grass in open country. They also nibble dry leaves, strips of bark and moss.
A wombat's front teeth and back teeth keep growing all its life, and its front teeth are excellent grass cutters. Wombats live on a low-energy diet and use energy very slowly.
The diet is dominated by fibrous native grasses, sedges and rushes, chosen according to availability: tussock grass in forest, kangaroo grass and wallaby grass in more open country, with dry leaves, stalks, bark and mosses. The Australian Museum notes that wombats have only two upper incisors, unlike other marsupials, and that both incisors and molars are open-rooted and grow continuously.
The IUCN describes the diet as nutrient-poor and the wombat's metabolism as among the lowest for mammals over 10 kilograms. The Animal Diversity Web notes that wombats revisit the same feeding sites, creating short patches of grass known as marsupial lawns.
A digging machine
Wombats are great diggers.
They dig with strong front paws and flat claws. They push the dirt back with their bottoms!
Wombats are among the largest burrowing animals in the world. They have strong legs, short wide feet and flat claws. When digging, a wombat scrapes away soil in front with its claws, then bulldozes the dirt backwards with its rump.
A wombat uses several burrows, between one and six in a night and up to 20 over a few weeks. Inside, it may build nests of grass, leaves and sticks in resting chambers. Wombat poop is cube-shaped, and wombats leave it on rocks and logs to mark their area.
Powerful limbs, short broad feet and flattened claws make the wombat one of the largest burrowing animals. The Animal Diversity Web describes it loosening soil with its claws and pushing it back with its rump, and building nests of grass, leaves and sticks in resting chambers; the IUCN reports use of one to six burrows a night and up to 20 over several weeks.
Wombats produce cube-shaped scats, deposited on rocks, logs and other prominent spots to mark territory. Their burrows also shelter many other species and may be critical refuges during and after wildfire.
Growing up
A baby wombat is called a joey.
It is born as small as a jelly bean. It grows in its mother's pouch, then follows her around.
Wombats can have a baby at any time of year. After about a month, a single tiny joey about the size of a jelly bean is born. It crawls to its mother's pouch, where it grows for about 6 to 10 months.
Then it leaves the pouch but stays with its mother for another 8 to 10 months, calling with soft 'huh huh' sounds if it loses sight of her. Wombats are grown up at about 2 years old.
Breeding can occur year-round, with regional birth peaks: December to March in the New South Wales highlands and October to January in Tasmania. After a short gestation, probably about 30 days, a single, very underdeveloped young the size of a jelly bean makes its way to the pouch and develops there for 6 to 10 months.
It then stays with its mother for a further 8 to 10 months; the IUCN states that young depend on the female for at least 17 months, and the Animal Diversity Web reports about one young every two years. Both sexes mature at about 2 years. The Australian Museum gives a wild lifespan of up to 11 years and the IUCN up to 15.
A night-time loner
Wombats sleep in their burrows in the day.
They come out at night to eat. Most wombats like to live alone.
Wombats spend about two thirds of their lives in their burrows. In summer they come out mainly at night, after the air cools down, and graze for several hours before going back to sleep before sunrise. On cool or cloudy days they may feed in daylight too.
Common wombats are one of the few marsupials that stay active above the snowline in winter. They mostly live alone, although their areas overlap and they sometimes share burrows. They warn others with a low growl or a loud hiss.
Wombats spend about two thirds of their lives underground. In summer they are mainly nocturnal, emerging after sunset to graze for several hours, perhaps returning to a burrow to rest, and usually sleeping again before sunrise; on cool or overcast days they forage longer and by day. They remain active above the snowline in winter, though less so.
They are generally solitary despite overlapping ranges and occasional burrow-sharing, usually at different times. Calls include a low guttural warning growl, a rasping hiss when alarmed, a 'chikker' sound, and soft 'huh huh' contact calls between mothers and young.
Did you know?
Other animals can hide in wombat burrows during bushfires.
Wombat burrows give shelter to many other animals, and can be important hiding places during and after bushfires.
Wombat burrows may provide critical refuges for many species during and after wildfire.
Helping wombats
There are lots of common wombats.
But some get sick with an itchy skin illness, and some are hit by cars. Kind people help sick and hurt wombats.
The common wombat is not endangered. Scientists estimated in 2023 that about 840,000 live in Tasmania and 432,000 in Victoria. In Tasmania, numbers grew over 34 years of monitoring.
Wombats still face problems. A skin disease called mange, caused by tiny mites, makes them lose fur and can kill them. Many are hit by cars, and long droughts can leave them hungry. People help by treating mange, for example with burrow flaps that put medicine on a wombat as it leaves home, and by caring for orphaned joeys.
The IUCN assessed the species as Least Concern in 2024, with an estimated 1 to 2 million mature individuals. Studies published in 2023 estimated 840,000 in Tasmania, 72,000 on Flinders Island and 432,000 in Victoria, and 34 years of Tasmanian monitoring showed increases of 2.6 times on Tasmania and 3.5 times on Flinders Island.
Threats include drought, sarcoptic mange (which caused a 94 percent decline at Narawntapu National Park between 2010 and 2016), dogs, vehicle collisions (2,391 deaths recorded by citizen scientists from 2015 to 2019) and persecution. Wombats are protected in every state where they live; fencing and wombat gates reduce conflict with farmers, and burrow flaps that deliver anti-parasite medicine have had local success against mange.
IUCN Red List
How is the common wombat doing in the wild?
- Least Concern (this animal)
- Near Threatened
- Vulnerable
- Endangered
- Critically Endangered
- Extinct in the Wild
- Extinct
Least Concern
Not at risk of disappearing from the wild right now.
See the IUCN Red List assessment · The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2022.2
Amazing facts
-
Wombat poop is shaped like little cubes!
Wombats make cube-shaped poop and leave it on rocks and logs to mark their area.
Cube-shaped scats deposited in prominent places serve as territorial markers.
-
A wombat's teeth never stop growing.
Both the front and back teeth of a wombat keep growing all its life.
Open-rooted incisors and molars grow throughout life; the incisors are efficient cutters of grass and forbs.
-
Other animals can hide in wombat burrows during bushfires.
Wombat burrows give shelter to many other animals, and can be important hiding places during and after bushfires.
Wombat burrows may provide critical refuges for many species during and after wildfire.
-
Some wombats live where it snows in winter.
Common wombats are one of the few marsupials that stay active above the snowline in winter.
The species remains active above the snowline in winter, albeit less than in warmer months.
Words to know
- marsupial
- a mammal whose babies grow up in a pouch
- burrow
- a hole or tunnel dug in the ground for an animal to live in
- grazer
- an animal that eats mostly grass
- nocturnal
- active at night
- mange
- a skin disease caused by tiny mites that makes animals itchy and lose fur
- joey
- a baby marsupial, such as a young wombat or kangaroo
Discovery challenge
-
What shape is wombat poop?
What shape is wombat poop?
What is unusual about the shape of wombat scats?
- Cube-shaped
- Star-shaped
- Long and stringy
Show the answer
Cube-shaped
Wombat poop is shaped like little cubes!
It is cube-shaped, and wombats leave it on rocks and logs to mark their area.
Scats are cubic and are placed on prominent objects as territorial markers.
-
Where does a wombat spend most of its time?
Where do wombats spend about two thirds of their lives?
Where do bare-nosed wombats spend most of their time?
- In burrows underground
- High up in trees
- In the sea
Show the answer
In burrows underground
Wombats spend lots of time in their burrows.
About two thirds of a wombat's life is spent in its burrows.
About two thirds of life underground, using several burrows in rotation.
-
What do wombats eat?
What do common wombats mostly eat?
Which foods dominate the bare-nosed wombat's diet?
- Grasses, sedges and rushes
- Fish
- Other animals
Show the answer
Grasses, sedges and rushes
Wombats eat grass and other tough plants.
They graze on tough native grasses, sedges and rushes, plus a little bark and moss.
Fibrous native grasses, sedges and rushes: a nutrient-poor diet matched by a very low metabolism.
-
How big is a newborn wombat?
How big is a newborn wombat joey?
What size is a wombat at birth?
- About the size of a jelly bean
- About the size of a cat
- As big as its mother
Show the answer
About the size of a jelly bean
A newborn wombat is as small as a jelly bean!
It is about the size of a jelly bean and finishes growing in its mother's pouch.
A very underdeveloped neonate about the size of a jelly bean, after roughly a month's gestation.
Places where you might see it
Explore next
-
Watch
Animal
Koala
The koala is a tree-living marsupial from eastern Australia. It eats almost nothing but eucalyptus leaves, sleeps up to 20 hours a day to save energy, and carries its jellybean-sized baby in a pouch that opens toward its back legs.
-
Watch
Animal
Eastern grey kangaroo
The eastern grey kangaroo is a big, woolly gray kangaroo of eastern Australia and Tasmania. It hops on powerful back legs, balances with its long tail and grazes on grass in groups called mobs. Its joey is born weighing less than a gram and grows up in its mother's pouch.
-
Watch
Animal
Tasmanian devil
The Tasmanian devil is the world's largest surviving meat-eating marsupial. It lives only on the island of Tasmania, comes out at night, and has jaws strong enough to eat a whole meal, bones and all. Its loud screeches sound fierce, but many of its displays are bluff.
-
Watch
Country
Australia
Australia is a country and the smallest continent, surrounded by ocean in the Southern Hemisphere. Much of its middle is dry and flat, most people live near the coast, and its animals include kangaroos, koalas and the platypus, a mammal that lays eggs.
-
Watch
Animal
Quokka
The quokka is one of the smallest wallabies, a cat-sized marsupial of south-western Australia. Most quokkas now live on two small islands, Rottnest and Bald Island, because foxes and land clearing made them rare on the mainland.
-
Watch
Animal
Short-beaked echidna
The short-beaked echidna is a spiny mammal that lays eggs. It lives all over Australia and in parts of New Guinea, digs into ant and termite nests with strong claws, and licks up the insects with a long, sticky tongue. It has no teeth at all.
-
Watch
Animal
Aardvark
The aardvark is a shy night digger of African savannas. It sniffs out ant and termite nests, rips them open with its spade-like claws and laps up the insects with a sticky tongue about 30 centimeters long. Its name means 'earth pig' in Afrikaans.
-
Watch
Animal
African buffalo
The African buffalo is a huge, cow-like grazer with heavy, curving horns. It lives in herds that can number in the thousands, and a herd will rush to protect a calf in danger. It lives across much of Africa south of the Sahara, from open savannas to rainforests.
For parents & teachers
What children will learn
- Describe how a wombat's body is built for digging.
- Explain why ever-growing teeth help an animal that eats tough grass.
- Describe a wombat's day and night and how it uses burrows.
- Explain the main threats to wombats and how people help.
Recommended ages: 3 to 17 · About 15 minutes
Talk about it
- Why might living in a burrow help an animal in hot summers and cold winters?
- Why do you think many animals use wombat burrows during bushfires?
- How can drivers help animals that live near roads?
Try at home or in class
- In a sandbox, dig a tunnel with your hands and push the sand backwards, the way a wombat clears its burrow.
- Make a 'marsupial lawn' chart: list which Australian animals eat grass and which eat other foods.
Key vocabulary: marsupial, burrow, grazer, nocturnal, mange, joey
Where these facts come from
- The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species , International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN terms of use (no redistribution of Red List data or range maps))
- GBIF Backbone Taxonomy and GBIF Occurrence Search , Global Biodiversity Information Facility (CC0 1.0 (backbone); occurrence counts are facts derived from records under CC0, CC BY and CC BY-NC)
- Vombatus ursinus (Bare-nosed Wombat), global assessment , IUCN Red List of Threatened Species
- Bare-nosed Wombat , Australian Museum
- Vombatus ursinus (common wombat) , Animal Diversity Web, University of Michigan Museum of Zoology
- Wikidata , Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)
- Wikimedia Commons , Wikimedia Foundation (Per file: Public domain, CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA only (credited on each page))
Checked, not yet human-reviewed. Last updated October 24, 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.