This is a truly beautiful critter that almost seems like it would be worth a 10,000 mile trek from California to see. For now I will appreciate it through your photos. Thanks for posting.
How big is a numbat? The size of a small house cat?
What a gorgeous, crisp photo...and what a delightful little critter! I lived in Bunbury, just south of Perth, for 2.5 years when I was a kid (1986-1988) and I visited Perth Zoo on two occasions. Would the zoo have maintained a numbat collection at that time? I know that now there has been a lot of success with breeding them, but is there only one on show at any given time? I would love to see a numbat, as if I did see any when I was younger I have zero recollection of the experience.
I have photos of numbats I took at Perth Zoo in 1987, and I'm fairly sure they had them on display for some years prior to that. I know they had been successfully breeding them at the time too.
Thanks Hix! That is exciting news to think that on two occasions I almost certainly saw a numbat, but I'll have to re-visit a series of Aussie zoos at some later stage in my life to confirm a sighting. I was at Cleland Wildlife Park near Adelaide in 2007 but I'm fairly certain that at that point there was definitely not a numbat on display (or even off-exhibit) even though I realize that they had a single specimen for at least a couple of years after that.
