Narrow-striped mongoose
Body length: 25 to 35 cm (9.84 to 13.78 in)Weight: 640 gram (22.6 oz)
The range of the Narrow-striped Mongoose (Mungotictis decemlineata) is small and confined in the western and southwestern parts of Madagascar. They are diurnal creatures, spending a lot of time at the open savannas or in the trees, all dependent on the kind of season (dry or wet). In the summer (the wet season) they can be found sleeping in tree holes, while in the winter (the dry season) they are found in their burrows.
The fur of the Narrow-striped Mongoose is tawny in coloration, and the underside is noticeably light. It usually has about ten black stripes traversing the sides and the back. Their feet have no fur, but the Narrow-striped Mongoose has partially-webbed digits. It has a bushy, squirrel-like tail with dark rings.
Their diet mainly consists of insects and other small creatures, but they are known to eat eggs, rodents, birds and snakes, even a small lemur like the Gray Mouse Lemur! On the other hand, they are known to peacefully co-exist with another type of lemur, the Sportive lemurs.
They spend a lot of their time inside their burrows or in the trees and they are competent swimmers. They are social creatures, and groups ordinarily are made up of close to a dozen members, and we are not only speaking of family groups here, they also have maternal groupings and coalitions, this gives a whole new meaning to the term "political animal".
They are monogamous and a female individual is pregnant for about 3 months, after which she produces a single young.
They are an endangered species, this is because of fragmentation of their habitat, habitat loss (incl. logging), but also tavy, which is the name for the Madagascan slash-and-burn agriculture. The fossa is among their predators.
Interesting fact: Egg shells are not a problem for this "thinking" mongoose, it can crack them by taking the egg with all 4 paws while laying on its side, and then throw (or push) the egg against a hard object.
Picture of the narrow-striped mongoose is taken by Grigory Morozov in Tsimanampetsootsa National Park, October 2007, licensed under CC Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0
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