Long-tailed Porcupine
Trichys fasciculata
Summary 3
The long-tailed porcupine (Trichys fasciculata) is a species of rodent in the Hystricidae family. It is monotypic within the genus Trichys. It is found in Brunei, Indonesia, and Malaysia.
Habitat 4
Long-tailed porcupines live in several different habitats and are predominantly terrestrial, preferring to live in burrows, caves, and fissures in or around fallen trees. Although they also climb trees and shrubs in search of food. They inhabit subtropical and tropical moist broadleaf forests such as rain forests, peat swamp forests, freshwater swamp forests, lowland rain forests, montane rain forests, and heath forests. They also inhabit montane alpine meadows and shrublands, along with subtropical and tropical coniferous forests. They sometimes occur in mangrove forests. They have been found at elevations as high as 1159 m.
Range elevation: 0 to 1159 m.
Habitat Regions: tropical ; terrestrial
Terrestrial Biomes: savanna or grassland ; forest ; rainforest
Wetlands: swamp
Physical description 5
Long-tailed porcupines are the smallest members of the family Hystricidae, resembling spiny rats. They can weigh from 1.7 kg to 2.3 kg, and can be up to 48 cm long from the head to the base of the tail. Tail length can be up to 23 cm long. The long tail can break off from the rest of the body, potentially saving its owner from predation. More females than males are found without their tails. Perhaps the males hold the females by their tail during mating, causing the tail to come off. Once lost, the tail cannot be regenerated. Long-tailed porcupines have four toes on their front legs and five toes on their back legs. Long-tailed porcupines are good climbers, because of their broad paws.
Long-tailed porcupines are black or brown on the upper body and white on the under body. Except for the head and underside, which are covered with hair, long-tailed porcupines are covered with flattened spines that are dark brown in color at the ends and white at the tip. This species has the shortest spines in the family Hystricidae. None of the quills are more than 5 cm long. There are hairs, similar to bristles, between the spines. Scales cover most of the length of the brown tail, which is tipped with hollow quills. These brush-like quills are concentrated at the rear and the hindquarters. Unlike other porcupines, when shaken, these quills do not produce any rattling sound. No information was found on physical differences, such as size, between males and females.
Range mass: 1.5 to 2.3 kg.
Range length: 27.9 to 48 cm.
Other Physical Features: endothermic ; homoiothermic; bilateral symmetry
Sources and Credits
- creator:Thomas Hardwicke, no known copyright restrictions (public domain), https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/Trichys_fasciculata_Hardwicke.jpg
- (c) Smithsonian Wild, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/smithsonianwild/5453776796/
- Adapted by Brian Martin from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trichys_fasciculata
- (c) The Regents of the University of Michigan and its licensors, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/18677645
- (c) The Regents of the University of Michigan and its licensors, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/18677646
