Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Carnivora > Eupleridae > Cryptoprocta > Cryptoprocta ferox

Cryptoprocta ferox (Fossa)

Wikipedia Abstract

The fossa (/ˈfɒsə/ or /ˈfuːsə/; Malagasy [ˈfusə̥]; Cryptoprocta ferox) is a cat-like, carnivorous mammal endemic to Madagascar. It is a member of the Eupleridae, a family of carnivorans closely related to the mongoose family (Herpestidae). Its classification has been controversial because its physical traits resemble those of cats, yet other traits suggest a close relationship with viverrids (most civets and their relatives). Its classification, along with that of the other Malagasy carnivores, influenced hypotheses about how many times mammalian carnivores have colonized Madagascar. With genetic studies demonstrating that the fossa and all other Malagasy carnivores are most closely related to each other (forming a clade, recognized as the family Eupleridae), carnivorans are now thought to
View Wikipedia Record: Cryptoprocta ferox

Endangered Species

Status: Vulnerable
View IUCN Record: Cryptoprocta ferox

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0) 
17
 Unique (100)
Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0) 
64
 Unique & Vulnerable (100)
ED Score: 33.27
EDGE Score: 4.92
View EDGE Record: Cryptoprocta ferox

Attributes

Adult Weight [1]  20.944 lbs (9.50 kg)
Birth Weight [1]  100 grams
Diet [2]  Carnivore (Invertebrates), Carnivore (Vertebrates)
Diet - Ectothermic [2]  20 %
Diet - Endothermic [2]  70 %
Diet - Invertibrates [2]  10 %
Forages - Scansorial [2]  100 %
Female Maturity [1]  4 years 1 month
Gestation [1]  90 days
Litter Size [1]  3
Litters / Year [1]  1
Maximum Longevity [1]  23 years
Nocturnal [3]  Yes
Snout to Vent Length [4]  30 inches (76 cm)
Weaning [1]  4 months 9 days

Ecoregions

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
Madagascar and the Indian Ocean Islands Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Seychelles Yes

Prey / Diet

Prey / Diet Overlap

Range Map

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1de Magalhaes, J. P., and Costa, J. (2009) A database of vertebrate longevity records and their relation to other life-history traits. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 22(8):1770-1774
♦ 2Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ 3Myers, P., R. Espinosa, C. S. Parr, T. Jones, G. S. Hammond, and T. A. Dewey. 2006. The Animal Diversity Web (online). Accessed February 01, 2010 at animaldiversity.org
♦ 4Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 5Predation on Lemurs in the Rainforest of Madagascar by Multiple Predator Species: Observations and Experiments, Sarah M. Karpanty and Patricia C. Wright, Primate Anti-Predator Strategies, Developments in Primatology: Progress and Prospects, 2007, Part 2, 77-99
♦ 6Effective predation defence in Cheirogaleus medius, Kathrin H. Dausmann, Lemur News Vol. 15, 2010, pp. 18-20
♦ 7Predation on Milne-Edward's sifaka (Propithecus diadema edwardsi) by the fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox) in the rain forest of southeastern Madagascar, Patricia C. Wright, S. Kimberly Heckscher, Amy E. Dunham, Folia Primatol 1997;68:34-43
♦ 8Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics.
♦ 9Small-scale coexistence of two mouse lemur species (Microcebus berthae and M. murinus) within a homogeneous competitive environment, Melanie Dammhahn, Peter M. Kappeler, Oecologia (2008) 157:473–483
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0