African Pine Cone

When giving presentations, I like to share this slide, and call it an "African Pine Cone". I challenge the audience to guess what species it is. They can't figure it out, so I give them a hint, saying the animal is toothless, has a long, sticky tongue, and eats ants and termites. People often try "armadillo", but there are no armadillos in Africa.

This is a long-tailed pangolin, or scaly anteater. Pangolins are found in Africa and Asia and they are persecuted for their scales, which are used in traditional medicine. In Africa, they are eaten. Most species are nocturnal, and they are easy to hunt, having little defense other than curling up in a protective ball, as seen here.

Pangolins stress easily and they do not tolerate captivity well, due to their specialized diet. Most of the pangolins I saw were heavily parasitized with ticks.

Photo by D. Messinger