The strangest mammal I have ever held (to date)

[AlienGirl]

That's a dead tenrec. The tenrecs I held were very much alive, and they had these funny little noses that they wiggled from side to side. Their skin was cool to the touch--they have very low, variable body temperatures and some other traits that early mammals, hardly differentiated from reptiles, probably had. The two I played with were very friendly and went crawling around my arms, sticking their little wiggly noses into the folds of my shirt.

Tucker

[Jamastiene]

1. Awwww!

It's so ugly, it's cute. I love it. I've never seen one of those. Thanks for sharing the experience and the picture.

[AlienGirl]

3. It was like getting to meet a rock star

I had known about tenrecs since I was about 12, but never expected the chance to touch one! The hedgehog thread reminded me of this, because tenrecs and hedgehogs are related.

Tucker

[XemaSab]

2. You win

I got nothing... :shrug:

[otherlander]

4. PUPPY!!!

PUPPYPUPPYPUPPY!!!! I WANNIT!

[Floogeldy]

5. So THAT'S what happens when a crocodile mates with a rat.

:)

[Oeditpus Rex]

6. Do they grow to be up to 800 yards long?

Dinsdale!

[MrSlayer]

16. LOL! I thought of Spiny Norman immediately as well.

Of course he nailed my head to the floor, he had no choice.

[Placebo]

7. It's like they combined Milhouse, Santa's Little Helper...

and a rat.

:O

[jobycom]

8. Someone has to say it...

OSCAR!!!

[Gold Metal Flake]

9. Thanks for this post!

I love cool mammals.

I found this page:

http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/Tenrecidae.html

[everythingsxen]

10. Awww

What a cute widdle monster. :D

[AlienGirl]

13. They're even cuter alive!

[Zookeeper]

11. I could google "tenrecs," but....

I have a feeling you'd like to tell us more about them (:+ ).

What is their natural habitat? What do they eat? Do people keep them as pets (if yes, I will try to keep Zoodaughter from finding out about them)? How did you happen to meet one?

[AlienGirl]

12. They come from Madagascar (mostly)

They're insectivores, so in captivity they eat any pre-formulated insectivore chow. In the wild they eat mostly bugs and worms, plus some occasional berries and stuff. People keep them as pets; the way I met them was my local exotic animal store in Olympia was closing, and the owner was selling his breeding stock and moving abroad. So this proven pair of tenrecs was being sold for $300 for both...I would have bought them, had I not been married to a guy who was anti-pet. (He liked animals in the abstract, but I like them in the living room; it was a marriage doomed from the start.)

Tucker

[Zookeeper]

14. I wonder about those fang-like front teeth....

They make it look carnivorous, but I suppose that would depend on the tenrec's size.

So, have you discovered a new incompatibility indicator? Pet lovers vs. Pet non-lovers? Like smokers vs. non-smokers? Liberals vs. Freepers?

[AlienGirl]

15. I'm a non-smoker and am okay with my partner being a smoker

But anyone who would object to a menagerie is obviously not compatible with me!

Tucker

[LynzM]

17. R.O.U.S.es?

I don't believe they exist ;)

Neato... what a weird, weird creature.

[Lisa]

18. wow! I've always wanted to see one up close!

With the platypus running a pretty close second.

I guess the most unusual mammal I've held so far, is my pet collared lemming when she was in winter fur (all puffy like a snowball, and her claws had developed unusual extensions for digging in the snow).

[Xipe Totec]

19. One of these critters

And yes, I know about Hansen's Disease...