Endangered
Nicobar Treeshrew
Tupaia nicobarica
Nicobar Treeshrew is a mammal in the family Tupaiidae (order Scandentia) — Tupaia nicobarica, recorded as Endangered.
Appearance
Morphologically, the Nicobar treeshrew resembles the squirrel and the mongoose, with an elongated snout, hairless and moist nasal pad, and lack of whiskers on their cheeks. The species displays a dorsal bicolor pelage and an average body weight of about 170 g, that helps with its identification as a comparatively large treeshrew among other treeshrews species.
Its lambdoid–premaxillary length averages 53.7 ± 0.79 mm (range 52.4–54.9 mm), while the mandibular condylo–incisive length measures 39.7 ± 0.46 mm (range 39.1–40.3 mm).
The Nicobar treeshrew was first described by Johann Zelebor in 1868.
Range and habitat
The Nicobar treeshrew only occupies the Indian Islands of Great Nicobar and Little Nicobar and can be found on the highest points of these two islands, 640 m (2,100 ft) above sea level. It lives in different forest types such as scrub jungle, moist deciduous forests, and montane sholas. It is endemic to the Nicobar Islands of the Andaman Sea, India. Where it inhabits the islands' rain forests.
Based on geographical distribution, there are two subspecies identified: T. Nicobarica nicobarica from the Great Nicobar Island and T. Nicobarica surda from the Little Nicobar Island.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet and breeding
It is most often observed as solitary individuals or breeding pairs that forage and rest together.
In crisis
It is threatened by habitat loss, anthropogenic activities, forest fragmentation, tsunami events, and predation by other animals. And is classified as an Endangered species in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
CITES lists this taxon on Appendix II. Confirm the current appendix on the CITES checklist.
Nicobar Treeshrew is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Nicobar Treeshrew, Wikidata item Q1338043. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
