Baby Wombat Housecall

*** WARNING – THIS POST CONTAINS EXTREME CUTENESS!!! ***

This blog barely needs any words. It’s all about the awwwws. Emily Small and her family run the Goongerah Wombat Orphanage. Goongerah is a 40-person town in far East Gippsland (Victoria). Ben and I don’t know Emily very well but she dropped some keys at our house for a mutual friend the other day. She happened to mention that she had to get going because she had some wombat babies in the car. Mistake! She wasn’t going to be going anywhere for at least half an hour!

Baby wombats are up there with the cutest things on earth. Hyperbole? We don’t think so. Emily told us that for their first few years, wombats make better company than dogs. They stay with their mothers for two years which is a decent stretch, so they form affectionate bonds and are very playful and personable. They love cuddles and scratches and enjoy games. 

There is of course a sad side to the story. These two gorgeous bubbas, like most of the wombats who pass through the orphanage, have been rescued from their dead mother’s pouches on Victoria’s roads. Emily’s two repeated message on social media are ‘be careful on the roads’ and ‘check pouches’. Sobering thoughts and important messages for those of us who travel through rural areas. 

Emily is studying Vet Science so that she can work with animals for a living on a permanent basis. At the moment she relies on her own household funds and a small trickle of donations to look after her young charges. She doesn’t seem to put any special effort into drumming up donations. It’s definitely a love job, and not such a hard one to understand. Nevertheless, it’s a LOT of work. Volunteers like Emily make an enormous difference to our native wildlife and their efforts should be celebrated! Check out and ‘like’/’follow’ Emily’s Goongerah Wombat Orphanage page on Facebook and consider slinging her a few bucks using the information on her ‘About’ page. It’s a very worthy cause. 

I’m off to die from acute “ness overload”. These two babies – named Dugong and Martha – have filled my cute cup! Their infectious sleepiness has inspired me to go and take a nap!

Until next time, thanks for wearing wombat diapers!

Michelle xx