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NAVIGATION
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The Reeves or Chinese Muntjac belongs to the family Muntiacinae within the order Cervidae. This currently consists of eight known sub-species. The latest addition to the Muntjac family was only discovered in the late 1990s when a giant and miniature Muntjac were discovered in a remote area on the borders of Vietnam and Laos. Muntjac are the oldest of all known deer and are therefore prehistoric; they retain characteristics which have since disappeared in our own native species of deer. The Reeves Muntjac (or "Barking Deer" as it is colloquially known) has in approximately eighty years adapted to living in Britain. It has successfully populated large areas of the countryside and is now possibly the most widely distributed deer in England. Reeves Muntjac are the smallest of our resident deer and are still not fully understood, which makes the study of them immensely interesting. They seem to have overcome the normal Cervidae susceptibility to internal parasites (endoparasites), the cycle probably broken by climate and location, using this advantage to equal Roe deer in a propensity to colonise and adapt.
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Four species of tapir exist on the planet today. All are closely related, although the Asian (often called Malayan) tapir lives in Southeast Asia, while the other three live in the Americas. The Baird's tapir lives in Mexico and Central America, and has been found in the northernmost areas of Colombia; the lowland (often called Brazilian) tapir lives in the rain forests of South America; and the mountain tapir lives in the high cloud forests and paramos of the northern Andes of Colombia and Ecuador. The tapirs are related to the primitive horse and to the rhinoceros. Prehistoric tapirs inhabited Europe, North America and Southeast Asia, including China, with no remains having been found on the continents of Africa, Australia, or Antarctica. Ancient tapirs would not have looked much different from their cousins of the present day, although their noses didn't grow to the present length until the last few million years. Although we don't know much about their ancient migration patterns, tapirs did migrate from Central to South America across the Panamanian Land Bridge about 2-3 million years ago. Tapirs like to bathe, and will make treks to pools and rivers for this purpose. All are dense and bulky with hard, tough skin. They swim well, climb well, and bulldoze paths through the vegetation of their habitats - vegetation on which they also browse for their main food source. They tend to feed in the early or late hours of the day, often before the sun comes up and after it sets. Thus they would be called "crepuscular" rather than truly nocturnal. Commonly, they sleep during the middle part of the night. However, this is not a hard-and-fast rule, and they can be active at any hour.
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The Amazonian manatee is a most bizarre looking aquatic mammal, and was first described as a curious combination of a hippopotamus and a seal. Its body is large, grey and smooth-skinned like a hippopotamus’, and its forelimbs are modified into flippers like a seal’s. It has no hindlimbs, and the rear of the body forms a flat, rounded horizontal paddle. The head is rounded, with nostrils on the upper surface of the snout. The Amazonian manatee is smaller and more slender than the other two manatee species (Trichechus manatus and T. senegalensis). It can also be identified by the lack of nails on its flippers, a characteristic referred to in its scientific name, T. inunguis, which literally means ‘no nails’. A unique feature (amongst mammals) of the manatee is the constant replacement of molar teeth; new teeth enter at the back of the jaw and replace old and worn teeth at the front. Recent evidence suggests that manatees may possess a unique 6th sense that enables them to detect pressure changes through sensory hairs.
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Coatis are active day and night. They spend their nights in trees, with several animals sharing the nest. While the male prefers to travel alone (and may be referred to as the coati mundi, or solitary coati), the females and their young tend to travel in bands of 4 to 50 individuals. New born coatis are altricial, or very immature at birth. The coati is a social animal, so it is very vocal with a lot of snorts, grunts, screams, whines and chatters. Most of the day is spent foraging, but during the hottest part of the day, they tend to nap in trees. Coatis swim well and climb excellently. They use the tail for balancing on branches and for slowing down the descent of the tree. The stout claws and long snout work, and used together for food gathering, they have an excellent sense of smell and we will see them snuffling along the ground. When they smell prey in the ground they will stop and dig there. They can also push dirt with their snouts. When coatis find a tree of a fruit they will visit the tree repeatedly until it is stripped. They are also very active hunters.  |
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The Three-toed Sloth (Bradypus variegatus) is the slowest of all land animals moving through the branches at one hundredth of a mile per hour! It is among the world's laziest animals, spending three-quarters of its life asleep. It eats only leaves and loves to "hang" out (upside down!) in cercropia trees. Sloths are often seen and they are in fact very common. They are hunted for meat, but because they are well-camouflaged, and generally feed high in the canopy, they are difficult to find. Their main predators are eagles, and jaguars will also hunt them.  |
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