Tailless tenrec
Tenrec ecaudatus
— Where the name comes from
Tenrec latinises the Malagasy tandraka or tandroka. Ecaudatus is the Latin “tailless”. It looks like a hedgehog, some of its relatives like a shrew, others like an otter or a mole, and it is none of these: it belongs to the Afrosoricida, an African order related to elephants, aardvarks and hyraxes — another piece of that improbable family, the superorder Afrotheria.
— Facts
- Group
- Mammals · Mammalia
- Order
- Tenrecs and golden moles
- Habitat
- Forest, bushland, farmland, village gardens
- Range
- Endemic to Madagascar; introduced to the Comoros, Mauritius, the Seychelles and Réunion
- Size
- 26–39 cm, 1.5–2.5 kg
- Diet
- Omnivore — invertebrates, small vertebrates, fruit, carrion
- Lifespan
- About 6 years
— Characteristics
- 01
It is the largest tenrec and one of the largest insectivores in the world.
- 02
The female has up to twenty-nine teats, the highest number of any mammal.
- 03
It hibernates for up to eight months in the dry season, unusual in a tropical climate.
— What sets it apart
It has the largest litters of any mammal: births of thirty-two young are on record, and the females have up to twenty-nine teats to serve them. The tenrec reached Madagascar when the island was nearly empty of mammals, and from a single ancestor the family diversified into forms resembling hedgehogs, shrews, mice and moles — filling niches that elsewhere belong to wholly different orders. This is the species that staked everything on number.
