What is a Tapir?

These rare mammals are ofttimes confused with hippos, pigs or anteaters, but their closest living relatives are actually rhinos and horses. Tapirs are a living fossil; they'be been effectually since the Eocene, having survived waves of extinction of other animals. They are South America's largest native land mammal, with adults ranging in size from 300-700 pounds.

A tapir'southward most notable feature is its unique prehensile nose. Not only can they wiggle their nose, but they can use it to grab leaves when foraging. When swimming, they can use information technology equally a snorkle! They are fast and agile swimmers. Tapir hides are very tough, and their bodies are streamlined for easy maneuvering in the forest. They have four toes on their front feet and 3 toes on their hind feet, with which they can run very fast for short bursts of speed through the forest.

Tapirs don't reproduce chop-chop like some mammals; their pregnancies are very long – 13 to 14 months! And they simply accept i baby per pregnancy. Tapir babies stay with their mothers for twelve to eighteen months. Though they are tough, resilient animals who have survived for many millennia, every bit their populations keep to decline, it is increasingly difficult for them to recover.

There are four living species of tapir, each with a distinct appearance and habitat range. Tapirs are found in the forests of Fundamental and South America every bit well every bit Southeast Asia. They are becoming rare in their habitats, more often than not due to habitat destruction and poaching, and they are designated equally either Vulnerable or Endangered as a result.

Learn About Each Species of Tapir:

Lowland Tapir

Tapirus terrestris

Baird'south Tapir

Tapirus bairdii

Mountain Tapir

Tapirus pinchaque

Malayan Tapir

Tapirus indicus

Tapir Global Range Map

Map by Carlos Pedraza, Tapir Specialist Group, 2008

Threats to Their Survival

3 major threats to the tapir include:

  • Existence hunted for their meat
  • Habitats becoming fragmented due to roads and farming
  • Inroad into protected park areas by subsistence farmers and illegal logging

Tapirs practice well where there are few threats impeding their normal needs to thrive in big undisturbed tracts of habitat. Certain areas of the Brazilian Amazon, Brazilian Pantanal, Peruvian Amazon, Honduran Mosquitia and Panamanian Darien forests accept healthy tapir populations.

Tapirs in the wild do have predators, typically large cats, though this consequence on their population is tiny compared to that of human predation and habitat consumption. Tapir young are born with a beautiful "watermelon" striped pattern on their hide, camouflaging them effectively from predators. Adults are skilled at running through thickets of forest and diving into rivers or deep pools of h2o to escape predators. Like all herbivores, they serve a role in the ecosystem past being a food source for predators.

Tapirs Play a Critical Office in Their Ecosystems

Tapirs shape and maintain the biodiversity of tropical ecosystems; without them, there would not be the aforementioned rich variety of animals and plants there. They are known as an "umbrella species" considering they have a wide-ranging habitat that also includes wild cats, monkeys, deer, and many varieties of birds and reptiles. If we protect their habitat, the habitat of many other animals is also protected.

Tapirs are helpful to their native landscape in many ways; one part is that of seed dispersers. Tapirs eat a variety of seasonal fruits; when mango or fig trees come into season, tapirs can frequently exist found underneath these trees, eating the fruits that fall from them, or are dropped past monkeys munching on fruit from above. The seeds of the fruits they eat are dispersed when they wander to a new location to deposit scat, and those seeds later on sprout and abound new trees, helping the forest to regenerate. Because of the tapir's enormous appetite for fruit, they have earned the championship "gardeners of the forest." Forest structure and diversity would be very different without the tapir in the mural.

Because of their enormous size and large range, the tapir is one of the showtime species in its habitat to exist adversely affected by human disturbance. Local extinction or population subtract may trigger agin effects in the forest, causing disruptions of some cardinal ecological processes (e.g. seed predation and dispersal, nutrient recycling), and somewhen compromising the long-term integrity and biodiversity of the ecosystem. These factors, added to the destruction of tapir habitat in recent years, justify the urgency for investigation of the status of the populations, and development and implementation of conservation and management plans.

Tapir Specialist Group advocates on behalf of tapirs and works to conserve their habitat and genetic diversity through research projects on tapirs, high standards of zoo husbandry, and networking with government bodies, conservation organizations, universities and zoos to create greater tapir awareness and conservation planning.