To celebrate today being World Numbat Day, Rob and John (aka Numbat Task Force and Australian Geographic's Conservationist of the Year winners for 2018) have kindly helped with some quirky facts about the Numbat.
World Numbat Day began in 2014 and is now in it's fifth year. Here are 5 interesting facts that you may - or may not know - about these endangered native Australian treasures.
Just like Zebras, Numbats stripes are unique. Like a fingerprint, each individual has a different pattern.
Numbats have the most teeth (52!) of any land mammal in Australia, but they don’t chew their food. They only use them for chewing nesting material for their burrows.
Numbats are the closest living relative to the now extinct Thylacine (or Tasmanian Tiger) ... let's not let these little treasures end up the same way.
Numbats are one of only two Australian mammals that are active during the day(diurnal). The other being the Musky Rat Kangaroo from Northern Queensland.
Numbats can’t count … haha. If a Numbat moves her babies to a different burrow, even if she has moved them all on the first occasion, she will keep returning and checking that she has not left any behind.
A message from the Numbat Task Force:
"The Numbat Task Force is very privileged to have the support of a great organisation like FAME, but the people we want to thank most are the donors, because without you FAME would not be able to do what it is they do best. Helping Australian flora and fauna."
For more information on protecting the last wild populations of Numbats visit the FAME website.
Photo credit: thanks to John Lawson for supplying this Numbat photo.