Tanuki-Japanese Raccoon Dog Research Assignment Paper

Tanuki-Japanese Raccoon Dog
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation
Tanuki-Japanese Raccoon Dog
* Introduction
* Common Scientific Name
1 Common names: The raccoon dog, also known as the mangut or tanuki in Japan, chaun-vulp in Romania, supikoira in Finland and mårdhund in Sweden, is a canid indigenous to East Asia. It is the only extant species in the genus Nyctereutes It is considered a basal canid species, resembling ancestral forms of the family (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
2 Scientific Name: Nyctereutes procyonoides
* Geography Range:
1 Japan, North China, Korea, North Vietnam and Eastern Serbia
2 Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania,
3 Serbia, France, Romania, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Denmark, and Sweden (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
The raccoon dogs are also introduced in into Altai, the northern Caucasus (Russia, Iran, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Turkey), Armenia, Kirgizia, Tatarstan, Kalinin, Penza and Orenburg regions.
* Specific Location( Country , Sate, City)
4 The raccoon dog has no specific location but it is native countries include Japan, North China, Korea, North Vietnam and eastern Serbia.
* Specific Location Biome
Taiga; Mountains; Forest (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* Background and Description
* The raccoons dog are not an endangered species (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* Raccoon dog resembles a small fox- like canid as its body is covered heavy fur that looks similar to those of raccoon of the North America. The fur are long and dense because they mainly occur in deep forests and in regions characterized by cold winter. It is distinctive feature is the smaller head ratio to body; the greatest head length is approximately 133 mm. The head is characterized by pointed low-profile rostra (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* Dental Formula: Incisors 3/3, canine 1/1, premolars 4/4, molars 2/2 or 3/3: All totaling to 42 or 44. Their carnassial teeth are small in size but have relatively large molars (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* Raccoon dogs heights for both male and female ranges from 38.1cm to 50.8 cm. The length between the heads and rumps ranges from 50 to 68 cm with males appearing bigger (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* Raccoon’s dogs overall body is stocky with a short legs.
* Body weight ranges from 4 to 6kg in the summer and from 6 to 10kg in the winter before they could go for hibernation. However, the raccoon dogs in Europe; Finland and Denmark, tend to be larger compared to those in Japan, China and other part so of East Asia. These discrepancy can be attributed to the existence of other Nyctereutes procyonoides’ subspecies Across Europe and Asia (Animal Doversity Web, 2016).
* In term dry mass, the females in Japan and China tend to weigh 0.5kg, which is greater than males.
* Raccoon’s dog furs is soft and dense especially in males. The head is colored with white muzzle, white face and deep black turfed furs surrounding close to the eyes. Additionally, they have black marking that transverse across both shoulders and down the back that appears form a cross-like shape (Barrows, 2011).
* Its ears are small and rounded in shape. The ears are also covered with black hairs with sheds of white hair inside (Barrows, 2011).
* The general body color is shadowy brown to yellow- brown dorsally but the coloring tend to vary in terms of brown pigmentation. Some furs are longer, tripped black and are mostly located at the dorsal parts (Barrows, 2011). On the belly parts, some have tan or lighter brown fur. Their chest and limbs are black and brown in color. Their tails are bushy, thick and black dorsally with light- yellow pigmentation and ventrally with a black tip (Barrows, 2011).
* Winter pelage is bushier and thicker than the summer pelage.
Dietary Adaptations
* Raccoon are omnivorous, as the feed on both vegetation and meat. The raccoon dogs manages to survive in the winter conditions because of their good diet adaptability (Hayden, 2012). With their sharp and string paws, they are able to fish where they can capture crayfish and other small fish from small streams and rivers. Its omnivorous nature has enables the raccoon dog to be an opportunistic eater and will eat variety of food within its habitats. For example, in forest, they rely on fruits, acorns, nuts, grains, birds and bird eggs. Those living close to water feeds on insects, amphibians, small’s mammals and some invertebrates (Hayden, 2012).
Predator Defense
* Raccoons are tough to defend themselves against predators. They can fights and defeat predators that are almost twice their size. Additionally, their nocturnal lifestyle enables them to avoid many predators (Barrows, 2011). Also, their fast climbing ability helps them to escape the grown that is highly infested with dangerous carnivorous. Even with the fighting back and avoidance technique, raccoon dogs still fall prey to a range of predators such as large hawks, wolves, snakes coyotes and wolves.
* Life Cycle of the Organism
* In their reproduction system, the raccoon dogs from mating pair when they go to hibernation from years to year. The raccoon dogs in Finland are reported to exhibit monogamy among pairs. Polygamy has been reported among the Japanese and china raccoon dogs (Animal Doversity Web,...