The Fossa! The Fossa Are Attacking!

Julien:  We thank you with enormous gratitude for scaring away the Fossa.

Gloria:  The whossa?

Julien:  The Fossa. They're always annoying us by trespassing, interrupting our parties, and ripping our limbs off--

As a little kid I would pride myself on knowing quite a number of animals species, with a special interest for the big cats, so when I watched Madagascar and found I had no clue what fossae were, I was immediately interested.

My guess is you also have no clue what the fossae are. That’s what I’m here for!

This is a Fossa - This picture was take by chris york

Not too surprising, (regarding the movie’s name), the fossa lives in Madagascar, an African island in the Indian Ocean. The fossa is Madagascar's largest mammal predator, and though the movie was right that most of their food consists of lemurs, they also eat rodents, lizards, birds and practically every other small animal they can get their paws on.

Instead of being active only during the day or night, the fossa is active in regular periods during both.  The most common times are early in the morning, late in the afternoon, and late in the night. 

Fossae are amazing hunters. Although in the movie they attack in huge packs, in reality the animals usually hunt alone. 

They can hunt on the ground or in the trees.  Their whole body is designed to allow for the best agility, speed and detection of prey. They have a long tail, as long as its entire body,  that he can use as a balancing pole while climbing. Unlike cats or most other predators the fossa walks on its heels, not just the toes. This allows for more stability. The fact that they can pull in their claws makes sure they are always sharp. The fossa can smell, hear and see very well and is an ambush hunter: with the claws on his front paws he catches its prey, then kills it quickly with a bite from its teeth . 

You (don't) see? No claws. This picture was taken by Nathan Rupert

As mentioned before, the fossa hunts individually during the non-breeding season, but during the breeding season hunting parties may be seen, often consisting of a couple or a mother and her young. One fossa climbs a tree and chases the lemurs, forcing them down to the ground where the other is easily able to kill them .  This cooperation requires communication. Fossas communicate using sounds, visual signals and scents ( Throughout the year, the animals produce long-lasting scent marks on rocks, trees, and the ground using glands in the anal region and on the chest. 

Explorers first arrived on the island some 2,000 years ago, and scientists believe that they would have been met by a bizarre assemblage of now-extinct beasts, including lemurs the size of gorillas and a ten-foot-tall (three-meter-tall) flightless bird, so the fossa would have been seen as relatively normal. 

Megaladapis edwardsi, a lemur that once lived on
Madagascar, created by Michael B.H.

Until recently scientists thought the fossa, with its feline features, was a primitive kind of cat or civet. It was a difficult decision because the Fossa has a long and spiny penis. Cats have a short and spiny penis, while a Civet’s penis is long and smooth.  You see the problem. But in 2003, genetic studies by Anne Yoder and colleagues showed that all flesh- eating animals living on Madagascar share a common ancestor and that the fossae actually are one of the largest members of the mongoose family.   

Remember the confusing penis story? The whole story gets even weirder. When females are about 1-2 years of age, they develop an enlarged spiny clitoris. The goal's to make it look like the male’s parts.  As they grow older it starts shrinking.  The theory is that this is done to reduce sexual harassment from males or aggression from females towards younger females.

Due to the fact that the Fossa is the largest natural predator in Madagascar, it isn’t hunted himself (with the rare exception of being snapped up by a stray Crocodile). Humans pose the biggest threat to the Fossa since they hunt them to protect their livestock and have destroyed 90% of the Fossa's natural range. Deforestation is done forthe  wood and to create land for agriculture . Due to the fact that Fossae not only require large solitary home ranges and that they are relatively slow at developing it is thought that numbers will continue to fall. 

Taken by Nathan Rupert

Want to help the fossas and have an interesting vacation all in once? Check out this site: 

I will publish a new article about an interesting animal species every weekend.

Do you have an idea for the following animal? Put it in a comment!

Or read this article about pygmy hippos: related to whales, sweat blood and fling poop.