The great anteater is a very strange-looking animal. It almost looks like a mistake of nature, as do most anteaters. None of the parts of its body seem to go with the others. Its very long head ends in a long nozzle- shaped snout. At the end of its snout is an inconspicuous slit, less than half an inch wide, which is its mouth. Another remarkable feature of the giant anteater is its tongue. It is round like a tube, twelve inches long and half an inch wide. This tongue is covered with a sticky substance.
The giant anteater’s four-foot-long body is borne on four legs that do not match: the front ones are strong and short, the hind ones longer and larger. The front legs have strong, sharp, curved claws—the middle claw may measure up to three inches in lengtk These claws make an effective weapon for defense.
When it walks, the giant anteater bends the claws of its front legs and walks on their outer surface. At night it waddles clumsily through the forest, pretty much at random, snout to the ground, searching for ants and termites. It has weak eyes and depends on its sense of smell to lead it to anthills and to tennite nests, which it demolishes with powerful blows of its claws. Then it gathers up hundreds of these insects with its sticky tongue. After its meal, the anteater retires to a shelter under dense foliage, rolls itself up into a ball and covers its body with its bushy tail. It sleeps peaceably most of the day.
Adult females have a single offspring each year. The baby anteaters are carried about on their mother’s back at first, and stay with her for about one year.
Great Anteater Pictures
