Download Prehensile-tailed Porcupine

Prehensile-tailed Porcupine
Fast Facts
What do they look like?
Prehensile-tailed porcupines are covered in quills, ranging in color from white to
yellow to black. Their long tails are also quilled, but have bare tips for improving grip.
Their prominent noses, hands, and feet are pinkish-grey in color. Their hands and feet
all have four digits with long curved claws on each for climbing. They have an
excellent sense of smell, but poor vision. Long whiskers on their face and legs help
them to navigate in the dark.
How do they behave?
Porcupine, Coendou
Prehensile-tailed porcupines are arboreal, spending most of their time climbing
among the trees in their forest homes. They are nocturnal, spending their days
asleep in hollows or on branches high above the forest floor, awakening at night to
forage. They rarely drink water, obtaining all the moisture they need from their diet.
When confronted, they may stomp their feet and shake their quills, making a rattling
noise. Like all porcupines, their barbed quills are not thrown or shot at predators, but
release easily when the porcupine is tense.
Scientific Name: Coendou
What’s on the menu?
prehensilis
In the wild, they eat fruit, flowers, leaves, shoots, and the inner bark of trees. At the
Zoo, they eat leaf-eater pellets, rodent blocks, fruit, vegetables, and nuts.
Common Name: Prehensile-tailed
Family: Erethizontidae
How are they born?
Order: Rodentia
Class: Mammalia
Range: Northern South America
Female prehensile-tailed porcupines give birth to a single baby after a 203-day
gestation period. Babies are born year-round and have reddish-orange hair and soft
quills, which harden in about a week. They are born precocious, with their eyes open
and able to climb within a few hours of birth. They are weaned after around 10
weeks, and are sexually mature in 1.5 years.
What should you know about them?
These porcupines, like others in their family, have a gland near the base of their tail
which secretes hormones, used to mark their territory. This contributes to their
musky odor, strengthened by the fact that they rarely bathe or groom their quills.
They have been observed displaying unusual courtship behavior, including rubbing
noses and ‘dancing’ on their hind limbs. Males have also been observed urinating on
females while courting!
Habitat: Rainforests, forests
Lifespan: Up to 17 years in
captivity; unknown in the wild
Conservation Status: Lower Risk
How can you help?
Prehensile-tailed porcupines live in the rainforests of Brazil, Bolivia, Venezuela, and
Guiana and are in danger from habitat destruction. The forests where they live are
being cleared to provide land for agriculture and urban growth. What you buy can
help protect forest habitat! Buy wood products that are sustainably harvested,
coffee which is shade-grown, and locally-grown produce.