Central American Agouti

Dasyprocta punctata

Very rareMammal

The Central American Agouti is a medium-sized, long-legged rodent with a speckled orange-brown coat that runs in a deer-like gait through tropical forest undergrowth. It is one of the few animals capable of gnawing through the extraordinarily hard shell of Brazil nuts with its strong incisors, and is an important disperser of those seeds. Agoutis reach the southern fringe of Mexico.

Habitat

Tropical forests and forest edges of Mexico and Central America

Diet

Hard-shelled nuts, seeds, and fruit

How common

Very rare

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