Owston's palm civet (''Chrotogale owstoni'') is a

civet A civet () is a small, lean, mostly nocturnal mammal native to tropical Asia and Africa, especially the tropical forests. The term civet applies to over a dozen different species, mostly from the family Viverridae. Most of the species diversity ...

native to

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

Laos Laos (, ''Lāo'' )), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic ( Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, French: République démocratique populaire lao), is a socialist ...

and southern

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. It is listed as

Endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and inva ...

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

because of an ongoing population decline, estimated to be more than 50% over the last three generations, inferred from over-exploitation,

habitat destruction Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

and degradation. ''Chrotogale'' is a

monospecific In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

. Owston's palm civet is named after the wildlife collector

Alan Owston Alan Owston (1853–1915) was born on 7 August 1853 at Pirbright, Surrey and was buried on 30 November 1915 at Yokohama in Japan. He was a collector of Asian wildlife, businessman and yachtsman, and founded the Yokohama Yacht Club in Japan. Alan Ow ...

Characteristics

The Owston's palm civet is a mid-sized palm civet at 57 cm (23 in), plus a tail of 43 cm (17 in). With its pointed face, it is sometimes thought to resemble a large

insectivore A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant that eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores wer ...

, such as a

shrew Shrews (family Soricidae) are small mole-like mammals classified in the order Eulipotyphla. True shrews are not to be confused with treeshrews, otter shrews, elephant shrews, West Indies shrews, or marsupial shrews, which belong to different fa ...

. It has a tawny buff-grey body with highly contrasted black markings on its back and tail. They usually only have 4 bands on their back. The last two-thirds of the tail is completely black. They look somewhat like the

banded palm civet The banded palm civet (''Hemigalus derbyanus''), also called banded civet, is a viverrid native to Myanmar, Peninsular Malaysia, peninsular Thailand and the Sunda Islands of Sipura, Sumatra and Borneo. It is listed as Near Threatened on the IUCN R ...

, ''Hemigalus derbyanus'', except for that the hair on the back of their neck are not reversed, and the Owston's has spots on its legs.

Distribution and habitat

Owston's palm civet lives in the forests and wooded lowland river basins of northern Vietnam, northern Laos and southern China.

Ecology and behaviour

Very little is known about their life history in the wild, though limited information has been gathered on captive animals. They feed mostly on

earthworm An earthworm is a terrestrial invertebrate that belongs to the phylum Annelida. They exhibit a tube-within-a-tube body plan; they are externally segmented with corresponding internal segmentation; and they usually have setae on all segments. Th ...

s and other

invertebrate Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate ...

s. The mating season is apparently in late January. After a gestation period of 3 months, a litter of 1-3 young are born.

Conservation

In captivity

The Carnivore and Pangolin Conservation Program, based at Cúc Phương National Park in Vietnam, runs an international conservation and breeding programme for them in cooperation with various zoos including

Newquay Zoo Newquay Zoo is a zoological garden located within Trenance Leisure Park in Newquay, England. The zoo was opened in Cornwall on Whit Monday, 26 May 1969 by the local council (Newquay Urban District Council, later Restormel District Council). It w ...

References

External links

BBC - Rare civets born at Newquay zoo
Viverrids Carnivorans of Asia Mammals of Laos Mammals of Vietnam Mammals of China Endangered fauna of Asia Mammals described in 1912 Taxa named by Oldfield Thomas {{carnivora-stub