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Phalangeridae
The Phalangeridae are a family of mostly nocturnal marsupials native to Australia, New Guinea, and Eastern Indonesia, including the cuscuses, brushtail possums, and their close relatives. Considered a type of possum, most species are arboreal, and they inhabit a wide range of forest habitats from alpine woodland to eucalypt forest and tropical jungle. Many species have been introduced to various non-native habitats by humans for thousands of years. Characteristics Phalangerids are relatively large, compared with other possums. The smallest species, the Sulawesi dwarf cuscus, is cat-sized, averaging in length, while the largest, the black-spotted cuscus, is around long, and weighs . Besides the large size, other key features distinguishing phalangerids from other possums include the presence of bare skin on at least part of the tail, and low-crowned molar teeth. They have claws on the fore feet, but none on the hind feet, although these do have an opposable first toe to help ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black-spotted Cuscus
The black-spotted cuscus (''Spilocuscus rufoniger'') is a species of marsupial in the family Phalangeridae. It is among the largest members of the family, only being surpassed by the bear cuscus. It is a relatively colourful species found in forests of northern New Guinea. It is threatened by hunting and habitat loss, and has already disappeared from large parts of its range. Consequently, it is rated as Critically Endangered by IUCN. Evolution and history The family Phalangeridae originated from the Australian rainforests by the early Miocene epoch. Since then, cuscuses have successfully diversified from the Phalangerids. Current research has indicated that the Trichosurini (possums) separated from the cuscuses that comprised the extant Phalangerids approximately 23 to 29 million years ago. This split supports the surfacing of Sulawesi and New Guinea. The emergence of these land masses implies that the ancestors of the cuscuses traveled to the New Guinea region that appeared ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phalangeriformes
Phalangeriformes is a paraphyletic suborder of about 70 species of small to medium-sized arboreal marsupials native to Australia, New Guinea, and Sulawesi. The species are commonly known as possums, gliders, and cuscus. The common name "possum" for various Phalangeriformes species derives from the creatures' resemblance to the opossums of the Americas (the term comes from Powhatan language ''aposoum'' "white animal", from Proto-Algonquian *''wa·p-aʔɬemwa'' "white dog"). However, although opossums are also marsupials, Australasian possums are more closely related to other Australasian marsupials such as kangaroos. Phalangeriformes are quadrupedal diprotodont marsupials with long tails. The smallest species, indeed the smallest diprotodont marsupial, is the Tasmanian pygmy possum, with an adult head-body length of and a weight of . The largest are the two species of bear cuscus, which may exceed . Phalangeriformes species are typically nocturnal and at least partially arbo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ailurops
The bear cuscuses are the members of the genus ''Ailurops''. They are marsupials of the family Phalangeridae. The bear cuscuses are arboreal marsupials. Almost nothing is known of their status and ecology. Although some scientists assign all populations to one species, ''A. ursinus'', others place ''melanotis'' as its own species. The genus is distinct, though, and some authorities place it within its own subfamily, Ailuropinae. They are found only in Indonesia on Sulawesi and some smaller nearby islands that are biogeography, biogeographically part of Wallacea, which from a faunal standpoint is intermediate between the Australasian realm, Australian and Indomalayan realm, Indomalayan realms. It is hypothesized that the isolation of the bear cuscuses on the island of Sulawesi in the Miocene accounts for the animal's morphological divergence from the rest of the family Phalangeridae. The genus contains the following species: *Talaud bear cuscus, ''Ailurops melanotis'' - Salebabu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Marsupials
Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a pouch. Marsupials include opossums, Tasmanian devils, kangaroos, koalas, wombats, wallabies, bandicoots, and the extinct thylacine. Marsupials represent the clade originating from the last common ancestor of extant metatherians, the group containing all mammals more closely related to marsupials than to placentals. They give birth to relatively undeveloped young that often reside in a pouch located on their mothers' abdomen for a certain amount of time. Close to 70% of the 334 extant species occur on the Australian continent (the mainland, Tasmania, New Guinea and nearby islands). The remaining 30% are found in the Americas—primarily in South America, thirteen in Central America, and one species, the Virginia opossum, in North America, nor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ground Cuscus
The ground cuscus (''Phalanger gymnotis'') is a marsupial from the order Diprotodontia and belongs within the family Phalangeridae, a diverse family consisting of the other cuscus species and the brushtail possums (''Trichosurus'' spp.) and the scaly-tailed possum (''Wyulda squamicaudata''). Names It is known as madaw, ket-ketm, or kñm in the Kalam language of Papua New Guinea.Pawley, Andrew and Ralph Bulmer. 2011. ''A Dictionary of Kalam with Ethnographic Notes''. Canberra. Pacific Linguistics. Description Body weight of the ground cuscus averages 2.5 – 3.0 kg. Head and body length is about 440 mm and tail length is 330 mm although wild populations show variation depending on their location, with individuals from lowland regions being the largest and highland animals the smallest. It has opposable thumbs on the hind feet, a prehensile tail, and a bifurcation between the second and third front digits to allow it to move easily within the trees and to feed in a s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sulawesi Dwarf Cuscus
The Sulawesi dwarf cuscus (''Strigocuscus celebensis'') is a species of arboreal marsupial in the family Phalangeridae that is endemic to Sulawesi and nearby islands in Indonesia. It inhabits tropical moist lowland forest and is nocturnal, folivorous and usually found in pairs. ''S. celebensis'' is threatened by hunting and deforestation Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. The most concentrated .... References Possums Mammals of Sulawesi Mammals described in 1858 Taxa named by John Edward Gray Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{Diprotodont-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arboreal
Arboreal locomotion is the Animal locomotion, locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some animals may scale trees only occasionally, but others are exclusively arboreal. The habitats pose numerous mechanical challenges to animals moving through them and lead to a variety of anatomical, behavioral and ecological consequences as well as variations throughout different species.Cartmill, M. (1985). Climbing. In ''Functional Vertebrate Morphology'', eds. M. Hildebrand D. M. Bramble K. F. Liem and D. B. Wake, pp. 73–88. Cambridge: Belknap Press. Furthermore, many of these same principles may be applied to climbing without trees, such as on rock piles or mountains. Some animals are exclusively arboreal in habitat, such as the tree snail. Biomechanics Arboreal habitats pose numerous mechanical challenges to animals moving in them, which have been solved in diverse ways. These challenges include moving on n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Brushtail Possum
The brushtail possums are the members of the genus ''Trichosurus'' in the Phalangeridae, a family of marsupials. They are native to Australia (including Tasmania) and some small nearby islands. Unique among marsupials, they have shifted the hypaxial muscles from the epipubic to the pelvis, much like in placental muscles, meaning that their breathing cycle is more similar to the latter than to that of other non-eutherian mammals.Reilly SM, McElroy EJ, White TD, Biknevicius AR, Bennett MB, Abdominal muscle and epipubic bone function during locomotion in Australian possums: insights to basal mammalian conditions and Eutherian-like tendencies in Trichosurus, J Morphol. 2010 Apr;271(4):438-50. . In general, they are more terrestrially oriented than other possums, and in some ways might parallel primates. The genus contains these species: *Northern brushtail possum, ''T. arnhemensis'' *Short-eared possum, ''T. caninus'' *Mountain brushtail possum, ''T. cunninghami'' *Coppery brushtail p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cuscus
Cuscus ( or ) is the common name generally given to the species within the four genera of Australasian possum of the family Phalangeridae with the most tropical distribution: * ''Ailurops'' * ''Phalanger'' * ''Spilocuscus'' * ''Strigocuscus'' The name is also applied in parts of Indonesia to the Sunda slow loris, where people do not distinguish this from the "kuskus" possums. Note however, that the loris, being a primate, is unrelated to the other cuscus species. Cuscus are marsupials, even though they have some appearances, traits and attributes like those of lemurs of Madagascar, which are prosimians. See also * Reduplication In linguistics, reduplication is a morphological process in which the root or stem of a word (or part of it) or even the whole word is repeated exactly or with a slight change. The classic observation on the semantics of reduplication is Edwa ... Further reads * New Species of Cuscus. N.p., n.p, 1900. * Image, Cool. Cuscus Journal: 150 Page ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Common Brushtail Possum
The common brushtail possum (''Trichosurus vulpecula'', from the Greek for "furry tailed" and the Latin for "little fox", previously in the genus ''Phalangista'') is a nocturnal, semiarboreal marsupial of the family Phalangeridae, native to Australia and naturalised in New Zealand, and the second-largest of the possums. Like most possums, the common brushtail possum is nocturnal. It is mainly a folivore, but has been known to eat small mammals such as rats. In most Australian habitats, eucalyptus leaves are a significant part of the diet, but rarely the sole item eaten. Its tail is prehensile and naked on its lower underside. The four colour variations are silver-grey, brown, black, and gold. It is the Australian marsupial most often seen by city dwellers, as it is one of few that thrive in cities and a wide range of natural and human-modified environments. Around human habitations, common brushtails are inventive and determined foragers with a liking for fruit trees, vegetable g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trichosurus
The brushtail possums are the members of the genus ''Trichosurus'' in the Phalangeridae, a family of marsupials. They are native to Australia (including Tasmania) and some small nearby islands. Unique among marsupials, they have shifted the hypaxial muscles from the epipubic to the pelvis, much like in placental muscles, meaning that their breathing cycle is more similar to the latter than to that of other non-eutherian mammals.Reilly SM, McElroy EJ, White TD, Biknevicius AR, Bennett MB, Abdominal muscle and epipubic bone function during locomotion in Australian possums: insights to basal mammalian conditions and Eutherian-like tendencies in Trichosurus, J Morphol. 2010 Apr;271(4):438-50. . In general, they are more terrestrially oriented than other possums, and in some ways might parallel primates. The genus contains these species: *Northern brushtail possum, ''T. arnhemensis'' * Short-eared possum, ''T. caninus'' *Mountain brushtail possum, ''T. cunninghami'' * Coppery brushtail ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Strigocuscus
Dwarf cuscus (''Strigocuscus'') is a nocturnal, arboreal marsupial genus in the family Phalangeridae found only in Sulawesi (the largest island in Wallacea) and some of its surrounding small offshore islands. Due to the unique biogeography of Sulawesi giving sub-regions of endemism, it is likely that there are several different species or subspecies as yet to be described by science. So far, the genus contains the following species: * Sulawesi dwarf cuscus (''Strigocuscus celebensis'') * Banggai cuscus The Banggai cuscus (''Strigocuscus pelengensis'') is a species of cuscus, a type of possum. It is found in the Peleng and Sula Islands to the east of Sulawesi Sulawesi (), also known as Celebes (), is an island in Indonesia. One of the fou ... (''Strigocuscus pelengensis'') References Marsupial genera Possums Taxa named by John Edward Gray Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{marsupial-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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