Pacarana
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|
||||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||
| Dinomys branickii Peters, 1873 |
The pacarana (Dinomys branickii) is a rare and slow-moving South American rodent found only in tropical forests of the western Amazon River basin and adjacent foothills of the Andes Mountains from northwestern Venezuela and Colombia to western Bolivia.
Also known as Count Branicki's terrible mouse, it is known as the "pacarama" ("false paca") by native Indians due to its superficial similarity to an unrelated rodent, the paca. It is a hystricognath rodent, and the sole member of the family Dinomyidae in the infraorder Caviomorpha; initially, it was placed with true mice. Some evidence places the pacarana as closely related to the prehistoric giant rodents that ruled South America millions of years ago, such as Phoberomys pattersoni.
It has a chunky body and is large for a rodent, weighing up to 15 kg (33 pounds) and measuring up to 79 cm (31.1 inches) in length, not including the thick, furry tail.
[edit] External links
[edit] References
- Baillie (1996). Dinomys branickii. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 09 May 2006. Listed as Endangered (EN A1cd v2.3)
