Woylie
The woylie or brush-tailed bettong (Bettongia penicillata) is a small, critically endangered mammal native to forests and shrubland of Australia. A member of the rat-kangaroo family (Potoroidae), it moves by hopping and is active at night, digging for fungi to eat. It is also a marsupial and carries its young in a pouch. Once widespread, the woylie mostly died out from habitat loss and introduced predators such as foxes. It is currently restricted to two small areas in Western Australia. There were two subspecies: B. p. ogilbyi in the west, and the now-extinct B. p. penicillata in the southeast.
Woylie | |
---|---|
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Mammalia |
Infraclass: | Marsupialia |
Order: | Diprotodontia |
Family: | Potoroidae |
Genus: | Bettongia |
Species: | B. penicillata |
Binomial name | |
Bettongia penicillata Gray, 1837. | |
Subspecies | |
| |
Historic woylie range in yellow, current range in red |
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.