The Nimble Numbat – A Critically Endangered Aussie Icon

This week’s #FloraAndFaunaFriday is dedicated to my favourite marsupial of all time - the numbat. And I’ve got a special reason: my good friends Rob and Tony from the Numbat Taskforce just sent me photos of a newly collared wild numbat they’ve released… and they named him Gregory!

That’s right - there’s now a numbat out there in the woodlands named after me.

My love for numbats goes way back. When I was a kid, my favourite book was “Rusty the Nimble Numbat.” That little illustrated marsupial with a stripy back doing his best to escape from mining destruction captured my imagination - and ultimately helped inspire a lifetime of conservation work.

When I led Australia’s first Threatened Species Strategy back in 2015, the numbat was one of the priority species. It still is. And it needs to be.

Why? Because numbats are rarer than China’s giant panda.

Let that sink in.

There are fewer than 1,000 numbats out there in the wild. They were once spread right across arid southern Australia - from NSW to WA. But now they’re only just clinging to survival in a few pockets of remnant woodland in Western Australia. They face predation from feral cats and foxes, loss of habitat, small population genetics and escalating climate impacts.

The good news? People like Rob, Tony, and the team at the Numbat Taskforce are making a difference.

They’re working in the woodlands to monitor, track, and protect numbats through telemetry, advocacy, community education, and old-fashioned passion. Every radio collar fitted, every individual tracked, is a step toward recovery. When I did my #eBike4Australia ride last year, I fundraised for them to get solar panels to help their work.

Aussie kids deserve to grow up in a country where numbats still live in the wild - not just in their imaginations and storybooks.

You can follow Rob, Tony and the Numbat Taskforce team here.

Gregory weighs 523 grams and is 12 cm long.

Tony has devoted his whole career to numbats.