Anteaters: Myrmecophagidae

Physical characteristics: The hair of silky anteaters is soft like silk. Their fur is gray or gold with a brown stripe on the back. Silky anteaters are 12 to 21 inches (32 to 52 centimeters) long. They have pink noses, tube-shaped muzzles, and long tongues.

These animals are also called two-toed anteaters because the anteaters have two toes on each of their front feet. Each toe has a long, curved claw. There is a smaller claw on each of the four toes on the back feet.

Tail length ranges from 6 to 12 inches (16 to 30 centimeters). Anteaters use their prehensile tails to hold on as they move through trees.

Young silky anteaters stay on their mother's back for six to nine months. (Wolfgang Bayer/Bruce Coleman Inc. Reproduced by permission.)

Geographic range: Silky anteaters live in Mexico, Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Habitat: Silky anteaters spend most of their lives in trees, in rainforests where deciduous trees undergo seasonal changes. The anteaters live mainly in kapok (KAY-pock) trees, where pods (dry seed vessels) are fluffy and gold and silver. The anteaters resemble the pods in appearance, helping the animals to hide from predators.

Diet: Silky anteaters eat ants off of leaves and from the insides of tree nests.

Behavior and reproduction: Silky anteaters are nocturnal. After they mate, the female gives birth to one young in 120 to 150 days. She keeps the cub in a nest made of leaves in a hole in a tree trunk. Both parents raise the cub, feeding it and carrying it on their backs.

Silky anteaters are hunted by birds like the harpy eagle and hawk eagle. While anteaters strike out with their claws at predators, their best defense is their appearance, since they blend in with kapok pods.

Silky anteaters and people: Silky anteaters are sometimes hunted by people as a source of meat.

Conservation status: The silky anteater is not a threatened animal. ∎