Irrawaddy Squirrel
Irrawaddy squirrel,Photo: Shaiful Islam Sourav
বাদামী কাঠবিড়ালি / কটা / চোরকাটা / রাশাং(খাসিয়া) / মান্দার(ত্রিপুরা)
Callosciurus pygerythrus, (I. Geoffroy Saint Hilaire, 1832)
| রাজ্য / Kingdom: | Animalia |
| বর্গ / Order: | Rodentia |
| পরিবার / Family: | Sciuridae |
| গন / Genus: | Callosciurus |
| প্রজাতি / Species: | C. pygerythrus |
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- Irrawaddy squirrel
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- Irrawaddy squirrel
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- Irrawaddy squirrel
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- Irrawaddy squirrel
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- Irrawaddy squirrel
Description
The Irrawaddy squirrel or hoary-bellied Himalayan squirrel (Callosciurus pygerythrus) is a species of rodent in the family Sciuridae. The Irrawaddy squirrel is a very common character in our country. Its body is elongated and unpatterned dark brown in color. It has brownish tail tip and pale gray underparts.
Length: Head-body 21 cm, tail 18 cm.
Voice: Harsh and vibrating chuk-chuk-chuk.
Habits: Diurnal and arboreal, but occasionally comes to ground. Occurs solitary or in pairs.
Habitats: Makes roughly rounded nests in tress by aggregating leaves and small sticks. It has an inner chamber with an entry in one side.
Food habit: Flowers, fruits, bark, seed, leaves, insects and lichen and, occasionally, vertebrate meat. Bombax ceiba (flowers and fruits), Chukrasia tabularis (fruits), Dyabanga grandiflora (flowers), Pterospermum acerifolium (bark) and Kydia calycina (bark) have been identified as important resources
Red List Category: Least Concern
Major Threat(s): There are no major threats at the species or even population level, although in some areas hunting is intensive enough to drive major declines in density an extirpation from very small habitat patches. Although it cannot survive in treeless landscapes and is therefore disappearing from such areas.
Distribution:This diurnal species occurs in evergreen and semi-evergreen forests and edge and degraded areas derived from them, including gardens, shifting cultivation fallows and plantations; densities are higher in heavily degraded habitats than in little-encroached ones. This widely distributed species is present in northeastern South Asia, southern China and western Southeast Asia: its entire distribution lies west of the Mekong, and almost all west of the Irrawaddy. In South Asia, this species is widely distributed in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal.
Native: Bangladesh; China; India; Myanmar; Nepal.
Reference:
- Wikipedia: Irrawaddy squirrel
- IUCN Red list: Callosciurus pygerythrus (Hoary-bellied Squirrel, Irrawaddy Squirrel)
- M. Monirul H. Khan, A guide to wildlife
