Chinese pangolin

Chinese pangolin ( Manis pentadactyla )

The Chinese pangolin or ears pangolin ( Manis pentadactyla, Chinese鲮鲤/鲮鲤, Pinyin líng lǐ ) is a mammal of the family of pangolins ( Manidae ). It lives in eastern Asia.

Features

Chinese pangolins reach a body length of 50 to 60 inches, including another 30 to 40 centimeters long tail comes. Like all pangolins is with them the top of the head, the back and the flanks, covering the outer sides of the limbs and the tail with horny scales. The scales are colored purple-brown in adult animals black brown and in young animals. The skin that is visible, for example, the unprotected belly is white gray. The front feet carry large grave claws, the hind feet have claws on. The head is constructed very simply, as in all pangolins and toothless, the tongue very long. Of the other pangolins but they differ by the relatively large eyes and the presence of external ears ( in the other Asian pangolins is just a thickened ridge present in the African species not even this ).

Distribution and habitat

These pangolins are from eastern Nepal and north-eastern India on the northern Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Thailand, Northern Cambodia Northern Laos and North Vietnam) spread to the central and southern parts of China, they are also on the islands of Taiwan and Hainan before. Their habitat are mainly forests.

Way of life

Chinese Pangolins are nocturnal and stay mainly at the bottom. They spend the day in self-dug burrows or acquired from other animals whose input they close. At night, they go in search of food, where they can also climb trees. In case of threat they can be rolled up into a ball, which is also due to the sharp edges of the horny scales hardly break.

Their diet consists mainly of ants and termites. With the claws of the front feet, they can break the bark or Tierbaue of insects with its long, sticky tongue they take their prey to him. They have no teeth and grind their prey with the stomach.

Threat

In Chinese medicine, the scales of pangolins in the treatment of skin diseases are used, as their flesh is considered a delicacy. For these reasons, Chinese pangolins were hunted. Since 2000, the trade in these animals or their body parts is prohibited under the Endangered Species Convention ( CITES), but it should continue to exist a black market. In the over-populated southern and eastern Asia, the habitat destruction plays a role. The IUCN classified the species in 2008 consequently of the risk category " low risk" ( near threatened ) to " critically endangered " ( endangered ) high.

System

The next of kin of the Chinese shed animal is the leading Indian pangolin, with which it forms the subgenus Manis.