The Bahia porcupine (''Coendou insidiosus''), is a

New World porcupine The New World porcupines, family Erethizontidae, are large arboreal rodents, distinguished by their spiny coverings from which they take their name. They inhabit forests and wooded regions across North America, and into northern South America. A ...

species in the family Erethizontidae endemic to the

Atlantic Forest The Atlantic Forest ( pt, Mata Atlântica) is a South American forest that extends along the Atlantic coast of Brazil from Rio Grande do Norte state in the northeast to Rio Grande do Sul state in the south and inland as far as Paraguay and th ...

of southeastern

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

. It was formerly sometimes assigned to ''Sphiggurus'', a genus no longer recognized since genetic studies showed it to be

polyphyletic A polyphyletic group is an assemblage of organisms or other evolving elements that is of mixed evolutionary origin. The term is often applied to groups that share similar features known as homoplasies, which are explained as a result of converg ...

. ''Sphiggurus pallidus'', formerly considered a separate species but known from two young specimens only, is a

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

of this species.

References

Natureserve.org
Coendou Rodents of South America Mammals of Brazil Endemic fauna of Brazil Mammals described in 1818 Taxa named by Ignaz von Olfers {{rodent-stub