The Echidna

EchidnaWhile short-beaked Echidnas may not be the oddest animals you’ve seen, their overall personality and habits definitely place it into the weird category.  With eggs, snouts, puggles, spines and backward pointing claws, they have plenty of oddities.

 

The Echidna is an egg-laying Australian mammal that is often known as a spiny anteater. It looks like some type of spiky ball, but has the strange ability to lay itself out as flat as a pancake.

 

The animal has a bird-type beak along with spines like a hedgehog. It lays eggs like a reptile, has the pouch of a marsupial and can live as long as an elephant. (Another animal that can't make up it's mind what it is.)

 

The first detailed description of the animal appeared in England in back in 1792. 10 years later, Echidnas were being eaten by people such as Captain Bligh, who had stopped over in Australia, however it was as late as 1884, when scientists learned that the animals actually laid eggs.

 

EchidnaAfter mating, an adult female Echidna will lay a solitary egg right into her pouch. About 10 days later, a puggle (a baby Echidna or Platypus) is born and remains in the pouch for a few weeks to suckle. Once the puggle has left the pouch and is mature, they become solitary animals and wander great distances to find food, shelter and mates.

 

Over the years, Australians have come to look upon short-beaked Echidnas as a type of mascot. The species is among the most widely, but sparsely, distributed of all Australian mammals as they spend their time roaming through all types of terrain such as rain forests, deserts, burrows, caves, bushes, swamps and seashore.

 

The animal’s spines give them a scary appearance, but Echidnas are known to be quite gentle. Their quills are basically modified hairs that they use to help them climb as well as ecright themselves when upended. The spines can also be moved to protect their heads.

 

They have short legs and backward-pointing rear claws, which are ideal for digging. They can dig straight down, and disappear in a matter of minutes, making them the Houdini’s of the mammal world. Adult Echidnas have no teeth. They use their hard, skin-covered beaks, to search vegetation, soil and rocks for their diet of ants, termites, worms, and grubs. When dinner is spotted, theEchidna gathers it up with its long sticky tongue and simply swallows without chewing.

 

Echidna in a ballEchidnas seem to be happy on their own, doing what they feel like as they have no set routines. They are active any hour of the day whatever the weather. They don’t build permanent dens, and sleep in any burrow or cave they may come across. They don't socialize and therefore don’t fight. They ignore all other animals except otherEchidnas when it’s time to mate. They are basically happy living anywhere and have no territory to defend.

 

Adult Echidnas have few natural predators, but Rosenberg's Goannas prey on the young. They do need to be careful of introduced predators though, such as feral cats, dogs, feral pigs, foxes and dingoes. If they are attacked they roll into a ball. However, foxes and dingoes attempt to flip them onto their backs and urinate on them, forcing them to uncurl. They also have to watch out for road traffic. If they can avoid these dangers, Echidnas often live for over 50 years.