Red-crested tree-rat

Appearance

The hair on the dorsal region is of intense red coloring, and a large portion of the tail hair is black (basal), but the last two-fifths of the tail are white. Its ears are small and light brown, and feature tufts of long hair on the inner surface, but lack hair on the outer surface. The thin whiskers can reach up to 13 cm (5 in) long, and has a strip of red fur around its neck.

Santamartamys specimens measure between 51 cm (20 in) from head to the tip of their tail, with their tails measuring between 18 and 28 cm (7.1 and 11.0 in).

Range and habitat

It is endemic to Colombia, and has only been found in Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta at altitudes of 700 to 2,000 m (2,300 to 6,600 ft). Due to the location's isolation and specific geological and climatic conditions, this mountainous region has high levels of biodiversity and endemism. It is believed that Santamartamys usually lives in suffering degradation.

Santamartamys was rediscovered on 4 May 2011 in El Dorado ProAves Reserve, a protected area of Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Set up on 31 March 2006, this reserve covers 1,024 ha (2,530 acres) at an altitude between 950 and 2,600 m (3,120 and 8,530 ft), and contains a large number of endemic or endangered species.

Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.

Diet and breeding

It is nocturnal and is believed to feed on plant matter, and is mainly rufous, with young specimens having a grey coat.

In crisis

IUCN list the species as critically endangered: it is affected by feral cats, climate change, and the clearing of forest in its potential range in coastal Colombia. It is known only from three specimens, a specimen collected in 1898 in Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta and identified by Herbert Huntingdon Smith, a specimen identified by the American ornithologist and entomologist Melbourne Armstrong Carriker in 1913 at the same location, and a further specimen observed in the same location in 2011. Following a reassessment in 2011, the species was listed as "critically endangered", with much of the forest in the potential range of the species having been cleared or degraded.

Much of its potential area is infested with feral cats (who feed on fauna), and climate change is a long-term threat to the species.

Red-crested tree-rat is Critically 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 Red-crested tree-rat, Wikidata item Q301130. 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.