The northern common cuscus (''Phalanger orientalis''), also known as the gray cuscus, is a species of

marsupial Marsupials are a diverse group of mammals belonging to the infraclass Marsupialia. They are natively found in Australasia, Wallacea, and the Americas. One of marsupials' unique features is their reproductive strategy: the young are born in a r ...

in the family

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, a ...

native to northern

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; , fossilized , also known as Papua or historically ) is the List of islands by area, world's second-largest island, with an area of . Located in Melanesia in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is ...

and adjacent smaller islands, but is now also found in the

Bismarck Archipelago The Bismarck Archipelago (, ) is a group of islands off the northeastern coast of New Guinea in the western Pacific Ocean and is part of the Islands Region of Papua New Guinea. Its area is about . History The first inhabitants of the archipela ...

, southeast and central

Moluccas The Maluku Islands ( ; , ) or the Moluccas ( ; ) are an archipelago in the eastern part of Indonesia. Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located in West Melanesi ...

, the Solomons, and

Timor Timor (, , ) is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is Indonesia–Timor-Leste border, divided between the sovereign states of Timor-Leste in the eastern part and Indonesia in the ...

, where it is believed to have been introduced in prehistoric times from

. It was formerly considered

conspecific Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organism ...

with the

allopatric Allopatric speciation () – also referred to as geographic speciation, vicariant speciation, or its earlier name the dumbbell model – is a mode of speciation that occurs when biological populations become geographically isolated from ...

'' P. intercastellanus'' and '' P. mimicus''. It is hunted for human consumption in New Guinea.

Names

It is known as ''laku ita'' in the Naueti language or ''meda'' in the Tetum Terik

Tetum language Tetum ( ; ; ) is an Austronesian language spoken on the island of Timor. It is one of the official languages of Timor-Leste and it is also spoken in Belu Regency and Malaka Regency, which form the eastern part of Indonesian West Timor adjoi ...

Timor-Leste Timor-Leste, also known as East Timor, officially the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, is a country in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the coastal exclave of Oecusse in the island's northwest, and ...

Habitat

The northern common cuscus normally inhabits disturbed habitats. These would include secondary forest, plantations, and gardens. This species is also found in primary tropical forests. While living in the arboreal environments, hunters in the area believe that the tree hollows are the preferred den site of the cuscus. Local villagers reported that the northern common cuscus can be found in any substantially forested areas from coastal monsoon rainforest and gallery forest to the remnant montane rainforest.

Distribution

The northern common cuscus inhabits the islands of

, specifically

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania, between the Indian Ocean, Indian and Pacific Ocean, Pacific oceans. Comprising over List of islands of Indonesia, 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, ...

and

, Wetar and Leti (both to Indonesia) through the Kai Islands and a number of the Moluccan Islands of Indonesia (including Ambon, Buru, and Seram); it is also found on the islands of Misool, Waigeo, Batanta, and Salawati (all Indonesia), and ranges over much of the northern part of the island of New Guinea (Indonesia and Papua New Guinea), including a number of offshore islands. It ranges as far east as the

, Papua New Guinea, where it is present on many islands including the islands of New Britain and New Ireland. It also occurs on many of the Solomon Islands. It is believed that many of the insular island populations are the result of prehistorical introductions, possibly including Timor, Seram, Buru, Sanana, the Kai Islands, the Bismarck Archipelago, and the Solomon Island chain. The northern common cuscus was introduced into New Ireland between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago, and into the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands, also known simply as the Solomons,John Prados, ''Islands of Destiny'', Dutton Caliber, 2012, p,20 and passim is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 1000 smaller islands in Melanesia, part of Oceania, t ...

after 6,000 years ago; in

Biak Island Biak is the main island of Biak Archipelago located in Cenderawasih Bay near the northern coast of Papua (province), Papua, an Indonesian province, and is just northwest of New Guinea. Biak has many atolls, reefs, and corals. The largest popula ...

and Supiori Island, it is also an introduced species.

Niche

Generally, its niche is thought to be that of a nocturnal arboreal

folivore In zoology, a folivore is a herbivore that specializes in eating leaves. Mature leaves contain a high proportion of hard-to-digest cellulose, less energy than other types of foods, and often toxic compounds.Jones, S., Martin, R., & Pilbeam, D. (1 ...

with frugivorous tendencies.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q209996 Possums Mammals of Papua New Guinea Mammals of Indonesia Mammals of Timor Marsupials of New Guinea Fauna of the Lesser Sunda Islands Mammals described in 1766 Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Taxa named by Peter Simon Pallas