Volunteer wildlife carer Donna Brennan was concerned when she noticed that someone — or something — had tried to enter her home.

Not in her wildest dreams did she think it would be an echidna — Novak the echidna, to be precise. And he didn't just break in once, he tried it twice.

Ms Brennan, from Yandina on Queensland's Sunshine Coast, said she first noticed someone had been trying to open the sliding door to her home on Saturday afternoon.

"I came back from a walk and had the glass doors locked [but] the screen door was open," she said.

On Monday, the culprit was revealed when little Novak appeared in the yard and approached the closed glass door. Ms Brennan was ready with her camera as the nosy intruder forced the door open.

"It then hopped up, came inside and then turned around as if it was going to close the door," Ms Brennan said.

"It has a very strong snout. They use it to dig for food so it has to be strong."

Sadly for Novak, it wasn't welcome inside and now Ms Brennan is making sure the door remains locked.

"If it comes inside, it could hide and I would not know where it was," she said.

Rescued from the roadside

Novak first came into Ms Brennan's care in February when it was seen walking in circles on a roadside near Moy Pocket.

"This is usually a sign of trauma so it was taken to Eumundi Wildlife and the next day it came in to my care," she said.

"It probably left its burrow too early."

The day Novak came to Ms Brennan's home coincided with the Australian Open tennis final between Novak Djokovic and Dominic Thiem, won by Djokovic and inspiring the echidna's name.

Ms Brennan said Novak was then aged about six months and weighed about 500 grams.

Now Novak, who may be a "she" as the sex of echidnas is only determined when they are ready to mate, is 1.4kg and almost ready to return to the wild.

Ms Brennan said echidnas were more clever than people realised and, in the two-plus decades she had been working with them, she had witnessed some interesting behaviour.

She said they came to recognise her voice and when it was time to come out for dinner.