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CREATURE FEATURE: European Ground Squirrel

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The European Ground Squirrel (Spermophilus citellus) is a rodent mammal in the Sciuridae family of squirrels. It is also known as the European Souslik.

The European Ground Squirrel has a slender body with a short, bushy tail. Its short fur is yellowish-grey, flecked with black hair. Its underside is pale. It has large, dark eyes and small, rounded ears. It has short feet with sharp claws for digging. It has strong, gnawing teeth. It has a small nose with whiskers. 

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CREATURE FEATURE: Western Gentle Lemur

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The Western Gentle Lemur (Hapalemur occidentalis) is an arboreal primate mammal in the Lemuridae family. It is also known as the Western Lesser Bamboo Lemur and the Sambirano Lesser Bamboo Lemur.

The Western Gentle Lemur has thick, grey-beige to ginger-brown fur. It has long legs, especially long back legs for leaping. It is a leaper. It has a small pink-brown nose, small rounded ears, and large orange-brown eyes.

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Crowned Lemur

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The Crowned Lemur (Eulemur coronatus) is a mammal in the Lemuridae family of lemurs.

The Crowned Lemur has a brown-orange crown on the top of its head. The female has a grey body with an orange crown, and the male has a darker reddish-brown body with a black and orange crown. It has a long non-prehensile tail which it uses to balance itself when jumping from branch to branch. It has opposable thumbs for gripping branches. It has long, slender arms and legs.

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Do monkeys fall out of trees?

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Do monkeys fall out of trees?

Monkeys are primate mammals with a tail. They use their long tail to help them grip branches of trees. Their tail also helps them to maintain balance when they are climbing. It is called a prehensile tail. 

Monkeys also have wide hands and feet with sharp nails that also help them grip tree branches. To enable monkeys to swing among the treetops, they have long limbs. 

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What is the difference between Old World monkeys and New World monkeys?

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What is the difference between Old World monkeys and New World monkeys?

Old World monkeys live in the African continent, in coastal Arabia, and in Asia. New World monkeys live mainly in the tropical rain forests of South American countries.

Old World monkeys belong to one family called the Ceropithecidae family. They are catarrhines, which means that they have narrow, downward noses. Apes and humans also have downward noses. 

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Agile Gibbon

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The Agile Gibbon (Hylobates agilis) is an arboreal primate mammal in the Gibbon family. It is also known as the Black-Handed Gibbon. It is not a monkey because it does not have a tail.

The Agile Gibbon ranges in colour from red-brown to black. It has a white brow. The male has white or light-grey cheeks. It has very long arms, which enable it to swing from branch to branch very quickly. 

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Eurasian Lynx

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The Eurasian Lynx (Lynx lynx) is a medium-sized wild cat: a feline mammal. It is a felid. 

The Eurasian Lynx has short reddish or brown fur in summer and thick, silky silver-grey to greyish-brown fur in winter, with a long grey and white ruff. Its underbelly, neck and chin are white. Its fur has black spots, although some Lynxes have dark-brown stripes on their forehead and back. It has black tufts of hair on its ears. It has powerful long legs with large webbed, furred paws to enable it to swim and to walk on snowy ground. It has a bobbed tail with a black tip. 

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CREATURE FEATURE: Binturong

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The Binturong (Arctictis binturong) is an arboreal mammal. It is also known as a Bearcat. It is not related to bears and it is not related to cats. It is closely related to the Palm Civet. It is a viverrid.

The Binturong has a grey-black, thick, furry body with short legs. Its tail is long, bushy, curls inwards at the end, and is prehensile, which means that it can wrap around branches. It has a short, turned-up, black rounded nose covered with bristly hairs. It has long whiskers.

Its eyes are large and black, with a vertical pupil. It has short, rounded ears, edged with white, with tufts of black hair. It has six short rounded incisor teeth in each jaw, two long sharp canine teeth, and six molar teeth on each side of its jaw. Its five toes have long claws. It has musk glands that emit a scent.

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Great Argus

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The Great Argus (Argusianus argus) is a bird in the pheasant family. It is a Galliforme, which includes heavy-bodied ground-feeding birds, such as the turkey, grouse, chicken, quail, partridge, francolin, and pheasant. It is also known as the Giant Argus. 

The Great Argus has brown feathers and a blue head and neck, with a rufous (red-brown) upper chest. It has black hair-like feathers on its crown and nape. It has red legs. The male has very long tail feathers and wing feathers covered in eye-spots. The female has a shorter tail and fewer eye-spots on its wings. 

The Argus in Greek mythology is a hundred-eyed giant. The Great Argus bird has eye-shaped pattern on its wings that resemble the hundred-eyed giant. 

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How does the Tree-Kangaroo climb trees?

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How does the Tree-Kangaroo climb trees? 

There is only one species of arboreal (tree living) kangaroos in the world. It is the Goodfellow’s Tree-Kangaroo (Dendrolagus goodfellowi). Other kangaroos are terrestrial, living on the ground.

The Tree-Kangaroo has adaptations to its feet to enable it to climb trees. 

The Tree-Kangaroo has longer and wider hind (back) feet, with longer curved nails, than the terrestrial kangaroo. 

The Tree-Kangaroo has longer front paws than the terrestrial kangaroo.

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CREATURE FEATURE: Red-Billed Blue Magpie

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The Red-Billed Blue Magpie (Urocissa erythrorhyncha) is a bird in the corvid family of crows and magpies. 

The Red-Billed Blue Magpie has a black head, black neck, and black chest with bluish spots on its crown. Its shoulders and rump are duller blue and its underparts are greyish-cream. Its long tail is brighter blue with a broad white tip. Its undertail has white bands. Its beak is bright orange-red. Its legs, feet, and eye-rings are also orange-red. 

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Brown Rat

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The Brown Rat (Rattus norvegicus) is a common small rodent mammal and a muroid. It is also known as the Common Rat, the Street Rat, the Sewer Rat, the Hanover Rat, the Norway Rat, the Parisian Rat, the Water Rat, or the Wharf Rat. 

The Brown Rat has coarse brown or grey fur. Its underbelly is lighter grey, brown, or whitish. It has a long body and a long tail. It has excellent hearing and sharp gnawing teeth. 

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