Zoo Tales

Staff at Colchester Zoo are delighted to announce the birth of a baby Giant Anteater born to mother Furai during the night of Sunday, 2, December.  The baby was discovered by keepers early on Monday morning when they were doing their early morning checks.  This is the first baby that Furai has had as she is still quite young herself, at just two and a half years old.

Furai moved here from Zurich Zoo on the 22, February, 2007, to join Gilberto the resident male.  They were mixed very successfully in May of this year and mating behaviour was spotted soon after.  The gestation period of a giant anteater is approximately 180 days and the baby was expected around the Friday, 7, December but keepers were delighted to find the baby on the Sunday, 2, December, five days early! 

Interestingly, females give birth standing up and immediately the young anteater climbs up onto her back.  The youngster seems to be really strong and healthy with a good firm grip on its mother’s back, which is where it will stay for the next six months - remarkably until it is at least half the size of its mother!  The youngster was born with a full coat of hair and adult-like markings so that it looks like a miniature version of its mother!

Their enclosure is currently taped off to give them the privacy and quiet that they need at this special time to bond with each other, so please pass quietly if you are passing this area in the coming weeks.

The Giant Anteater is the largest species of anteater.  It is found in Central and South America, and lives in a natural habitat of grasslands, woodlands and rainforest.  It is a solitary animal, which feeds mainly on ants and termites, sometimes up to 30,000 insects in a single day.  It is one of only two types of mammals without any teeth even in adult hood.  Instead an anteater crushes insects it consumes using hard growths found on the inside of its mouth, and its muscular stomach. Anteaters grow to a size of 6 feet to 8 feet long, and weighs up to 140 pounds (65 kg).

The Giant Anteater is covered with stiff, straw-like hair which grows up to 40 cm long on the tail.  Their young have soft hair until they mature, when it becomes stiff and coarse like their parents.  The Giant Anteater is generally acknowledged to have a keen sense of smell, used to locate ants, but is thought to have poor sight and hearing.  Their sense of smell is indeed highly developed and is thought to be 40 times that of humans!  An anteater's tongue can reach two feet in length, and is covered in a sticky saliva, allowing it to trap ants, and can extend and withdraw it up to 150 times per minute, allowing it to consume as many of the ants or termites as possible before they all run away!

When threatened, the Giant Anteater stands up on its hind legs, using its tail to aid its balance, and may strike extremely rapidly with its claws or ‘hug’ attackers much like a bear, and squeeze its attacker to death.  An adult anteater is capable of fending off or even killing its main predators, big cats such as the jaguar and the cougar.  In fact, due to this behaviour it is known amongst the South American population as the ‘Embracer of Death’.

Habitat destruction and clearance is the primary threat to giant anteaters, but the jaguar and the cougar are also known predators of giant anteaters. They are often killed by humans, either intentionally through hunting for their pelts or unintentionally through collisions with cars.  They are part of an EEP breeding programme here at Colchester Zoo as they are seen to have a threatened status in the wild.  This new birth is excellent news for the development of the European breeding programme that they belong too.