The echidna, or anteater as it’s known, looks like an oversized hedgehog with a long, thin nose – perhaps one of nature’s strangest creations! Especially when you add that they are one of the few mammals that lay eggs in a pouch! (The other is the duck-billed platypus.)
Here are 20 more interesting facts about Echidna (Australia’s version of the hedgehog):
1 – The echidna, Tachyglossidae , is a very primitive mammal – as oviposition would show – and is native to New Guinea and Australia.
2 – There are four living species of echidna in two families, Tachyglossus and Zaglossus . The only member of Tachyglossus is T. aculeatus (meaning “spiky, swift tongue”), also known as the short-beaked echidna, while the three members of Zaglossus are Z. bruijni , the western long -beaked echidna, Z. attenboroughi , Sir David’s long-beaked echidna, and Z. Bartoni , the eastern long-beaked echidna. The long-beaked echidna are found only in the New Guinea highlands, but the short-beaked echidna are found throughout New Guinea and Australia where their food is always available.
3 – Egg-laying mammals are known as “monotremes.” and despite their nickname, the sting anteater, echidnas are not at all related to the true anteaters of America. They are considered to be quite intelligent, perhaps on the same level as cats.
Looks
5 – The Echidna is a small mammal with a long narrow snout, coarse short brown fur and 50mm cream colored spines on the back and sides. Each of these spines consists of a single hair and is made of keratin, the same substance that makes up human toes and fingernails.
6 – The snout is about 7-8 cm long and rigid so it can be used to dig into rotten wood and termite mounds to find food and it has a small mouth at the bottom showing its extremely long, contains sticky tongue.
7 – The monotremes are the only terrestrial mammals to have evolved electroreception, or the ability to sense the natural electric fields emitted by all living things through the use of electroreceptors in their snout. Since it works much better in water or in very wet areas on land, this ability in the echidnas (which don’t go into the water very much at all) is taken as an evolutionary step backwards and an indication that they shared a common ancestor the platypus way back , if.
The long-beaked echidnas have around 2,000 electroreceptors in the snout, but the short-beaked echidna only has about 400, clustered at the extreme end (these numbers compare to the 40,000 of the platypus, which uses the ability much more as it spends a lot of time spends in the water).
8 – The echidna is a solitary animal that can grow up to 50 cm long, weigh 2 to 5 kg and live around 45 to 50 years.
9 – Like male platypuses, male echidnas have spikes on their heels called spurs, but unlike the platypus, they do not have venom glands.
behavior
10 – Contrary to their nickname, not all echidnas live solely on ants, termites and the like. The short-beaked echidna are alive, but the long-beaked echidna live in humid tropical forests and use their electroreceptors to search for earthworms and insect larvae.
11 – They use their strong clawed paws to break open the rotten trunks, leaf mold, anthills or termite mounds and a long and sticky tongue to catch the ants, termites, worms and insect maggots thus flushed out. You have to eat hundreds of these tiny insects every day to stay alive.
12 – An amazing fact about Echidna is their ability to roll into a ball when threatened Like the hedgehog, the spikes on their back protect them from attack. They also have long claws that they use to penetrate anthills, so their undersides aren’t exactly defended either. Sometimes they will instead “dig” for freedom, or hide in a log or crevice to ensure they have their backs to the opening – so that a row of spikes is presented to the predator.
13 – Echidnas drink water and can swim. They are also very strong – they can lift twice their own weight if they need to get something out of the way.
family life
14 – When echidnas mate, they do it belly to belly – otherwise it would be quite a painful experience for the male!
15 – The male has a retractable four-headed penis and uses two heads at a time (with each change between pairs).
16 – The female’s single egg is laid in her pouch about two weeks after mating and hatches about ten days later. The infant “puggle” (what a wonderful name!) is born blind and hairless.
17 – The Puggle feeds on mother’s milk through a gland in the pouch for two months or so, but then its spines start to grow and understandably the mother insists it comes out! She burrows it into a burrow and comes back every few days to nurse it until it is about seven months old and ready to be weaned.
Echidnas and us
18 – The echidna is on the reverse of the five cent coin in Australia.
19 – An echidna named Millie was the mascot for the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney.
20 – Knuckles is a red echidna from the video game series ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’, first appearing in Sonic 3 (for Sega Genesis and Sega Mega Drive).