Over 500 numbats now thought to be living in Dryandra Woodlands near Narrogin

Numbats are spreading quickly throughout the Dryandra Woodlands near Narrogin with more than 500 numbats now thought to be living in the region.

Last week, it was revealed that all 60 cameras in the Dryandra Camera Array have recorded numbat activity over a sixth-month period.

That is a dramatic improvement, even compared to last year when only 30 cameras captured numbats in the same period. The findings suggest numbats are growing in numbers and also dispersing.

“It is fair to say that no matter where you are in Dryandra at the moment you have a good chance of seeing one of these little gems in the wild,” Numbat Task Force said in a Facebook post last week.

Numbats once roamed over much of southern Australia, extending from the west coast to north-west Victoria and even western NSW.

But by the 1970s, they had all but disappeared with only two populations remaining in Dryandra and at Perup Nature Reserve near Manjimup.

In 2014, it was estimated that just 50 individuals remained in Dryandra.

The recovery has been the result of a lot of hard work, according to John Lawson from the Numbat Task Force.

Mr Lawson said a key factor in the population’s recovery was the elimination of feral cats through Eradicat baiting.

“We know for a fact that this whole main block of Dryandra has numbats in it,” he said.