page_title: Common wombat
section_title: Taxonomy
hierarchical_section_title: Common wombat / Taxonomy
caption_attribution_description: Illustration of the now extinct wombats of King Island, Tasmania.
context_page_description: The common wombat, also known as the coarse-haired wombat or bare-nosed wombat, is a marsupial, one of three extant species of wombats and the only one in the genus Vombatus. The common wombat grows to an average of 98 cm long and a weight of 26 kg.
context_section_description: The common wombat was first described by George Shaw in 1800. Three subspecies are noted, though their distinctness is somewhat uncertain:
  V. u. hirsutus is found on the Australian mainland.
  V. u. tasmaniensis is found in Tasmania. It is smaller than V. ursinus hirsutus.
  V. u. ursinus, the nominate form, was once found throughout the Bass Strait Islands, but is now restricted to Flinders Island to the north of Tasmania. Its population was estimated at 4,000 in 1996 and is listed as vulnerable by the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and IUCN Red List.
  Hackett's wombat (Vombatus hacketti) was the other species in the genus, inhabiting the southwest of Australia. Being around the same size as V. ursinus, with an average weight of 30 kg, V. hacketti went extinct at the end of the Late Pleistocene, in the Quaternary extinction event.
caption: 1807 illustration of the now-extinct wombats of King Island
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