Genus Hystrix — The Porcupine
“Spines cylindrical; tail short, covered with spines and slender-stalked open quills; nasal cavity usually very large; air sinuses of frontals greatly developed; teeth as in Atherura. The hind-feet with five toes; claws very stout.”
The hinder part of the body is covered by a great number of sharp spines, ringed black and white, mostly tipped with white; the spines are hollow or filled with a spongy tissue, but extremely tough and resistant, with points as sharp as a needle. The animal is able to erect these by a contraction of the skin, but the old idea that they could be projected or shot out at an assailant is erroneous. They easily drop out, which may have given an idea of discharge. The porcupine attacks by backing up against an opponent or thrusting at him by a sidelong motion. I kept one some years ago, and had ample opportunity of studying his mode of defence. When a dog or any other foe comes to close quarters, the porcupine wheels round and rapidly charges back. They also have a side-way jerk which is effective.
No. 403. HYSTRIX LEUCURA.
The White-tailed Indian Porcupine (Jerdon’s No. 204).
Native Names.—Kanta-sahi, Sayi, Sayal, Sarsel, Hindi; Sajru, Bengali; Chotia-dumsee, Nepali; Saori, Gujrati; Salendra and Sayal, Mahrathi; Yed, Canarese; Ho-igu, Gondi; Phyoo, Burmese; Heetava, Singhalese.
Habitat.—All over India (except perhaps Lower Bengal), Burmah and Ceylon.
Description.—Blackish-brown; muzzle clad with short, stiff, bristly hairs; whiskers long and black, and a few white spines on the face; spines on the throat short, grooved, some with white setaceous points forming a half-collar; crest of head and neck formed of long black bristles, with here and there one with a long white tip; the spines of the sides are short, flattish, grooved or striated, mostly with white points; the large quills of the back are either entirely black or ringed at the base and middle with white, a few with white tips; the longer and thinner quills on the back and sides have long white terminations; many of these again, particularly the longest, have a basal and one or two central white rings; the short quills on the mesial line of the lumbar region are nearly all white, and the longer striated quills of this region are mostly white; quills of the tail white or yellowish, a few black ones at the root; pedunculated quills are long, broad, and much flattened in old animals.
Size.—Head and body, 32 inches; tail, 8 inches.
The description given in his ‘Prodromus Faunæ Zeylanicæ’ by Dr. Kellaart, who was a most careful observer, has been of great assistance to me in the above, as it was also, I fancy, to Jerdon, and his subsequent remarks are worthy of consideration. “The identification of species from single characters,” he observes, “is at all times difficult and unsatisfactory in the genus Hystrix, particularly so as regard the conformation of the skull.” And again: “The number of molars varies also in different specimens. In two adults obtained at Trincomalee there were only three molars on each side of the jaw, four being the dental formula of the genus Hystrix.”
I think such aberrations ought to warn us from trying to make too many genera out of these animals. Dr. Gray, whose particular forte—or shall I say weakness?—was minute subdivision, classed (in 1847) the Indian porcupines in three sub-families, Hystrix, Acanthion, and Atherura; and Acanthion he some years after (1866, see ‘P. Z. S.’ p. 308) divided again into three groups, OEdocephalus, Acanthochærus and Acanthion. The difference in the skull of Hystrix and Acanthion lies in the intermaxillaries and the grinders, as follows:—
Hystrix—Inter-max. broad, truncated, wide behind as before; grinders oblong, longer than broad, one fold on the inner, and three or four on the outer side.
Acanthion—Inter-max. triangular, tapering behind; grinders sub-cylindrical, not longer than broad, one fold on the inner, two or three on the outer side.
According to Waterhouse the European porcupine (Hystrix cristata of Linnæus) is the Acanthion Cuvieri of Gray; and Gray, who afterwards modified his views of 1847 in 1866, wrote of it: “I am not aware of any external characters by which this species can be distinguished from the Hystrix cristata, though the skull is so different.” Gray in another place writes that: “Though the skulls of H. leucurus preserve a very distinct character, yet they vary so much amongst themselves as to show that skulls afford no better character for the distinction of species than any other single character, such as colour, but can only be depended on when taken in connection with the rest of the organisation.” In these circumstances I think it will be better not to attempt any further subdivision of the Indian porcupines in the present work beyond the two already given, viz. Hystrix and Atherura. There is a great similarity between the Indian H. leucura and the European H. cristata. According to Waterhouse the quills in the lumbar region, which are white in the Indian, are dusky in the European, which last has long white points to the bristles of the crest, whereas in the Indian one some only of the points are white, and the rest quite brown.
The Indian porcupine lives in burrows, in banks, hill sides, on the bunds of tanks, and in the sides of rivers and nullahs. It is nocturnal in its habits, and in the vicinity of cultivation does much damage to such garden stuff as consists of tubers or roots. In the jungle its food consists chiefly of roots, especially of some kinds of wild yam (Dioscorea). I have found porcupines in the densest bamboo jungles of the central provinces, where their food was doubtless young bamboo shoots and various kind of roots.
The porcupine all the world over is known to be good eating, and is in many countries esteemed a delicacy. The flesh is white and tender, and is much prized by most people in those places where it abounds. Brigadier-General McMaster, in his ‘Notes on Jerdon,’ in speaking of the only instance where he found a porcupine on the move after daylight, says: “Just at dawn a porcupine appeared, and, as I suppose his house was somewhere between us, trotted and fed, grunting hog-like, about the little valley at our feet until long after the sun was well up, and until I, despairing of other game, and bearing in mind his delicious flesh (for that of a porcupine is the most delicate I know of), shot him. Well may the flesh be tender and of delicate flavour, for, as many gardeners know to their cost, porcupines are most scrupulously dainty and epicurean as to their diet. A pine-apple is left by them until the very night before it is fit to be cut. Peas, potatoes, onions, &c., are not touched until the owner has made up his mind that they were just ready for the table.” The Gonds in Seonee were always on the lookout for a porcupine. I described in my book on that district the digging out of one.
“The entrance of the animal’s abode was a hole in a bank at which the dogs were yelping and scratching; but the bipeds had gone more scientifically to work by countermining from above, sinking shafts downwards at various points, till at last they reached his inner chamber, when he scuttled out, and, charging backwards at the dogs with all his spines erected, he soon sent them flying, howling most piteously; but a Gondee axe hurled at his head soon put an end to his career, for a porcupine’s skull is particularly tender.”
The female produces from two to four young, which are born with their eyes open. Their bodies are covered with short soft spines, which, however, speedily harden. It is said that the young do not remain long with their mother, but I cannot speak to this from personal experience. I have had young ones, but not those born in captivity.
No. 404. Hystrix Bengalensis.
The Bengal Porcupine (Jerdon’s No. 205).
Native Name.—Sajaru or Sajru, Bengali.
Description.—“Smaller than the last; crest small and thin; the bristles blackish; body spines much flattened and strongly grooved, terminating in a slight seta Or bristle; slender flexible quills much fewer than in leucura, white, with a narrow black band about the centre; the thick quills basally white, the rest black, mostly with a white tip; a distinct white demi-collar; spines of lumbar region white, as are those of tail and rattle; muzzle less hirsute than in leucura.”
Size.—Head and body, 28 inches; tail, 8 inches.
There is occasionally a variety to be found of this species with orange-coloured quills, or rather the orange hue is assumed at times. Jerdon mentions the fact that Sclater describes his H. Malabarica as having certain orange-coloured quills in place of white, and also that Blyth considered the two species identical. He also states that Mr. Day procured specimens of the orange porcupine from the Ghâts of Cochin and Travancore, and that they were considered more delicate eating by the native sportsmen, who aver that they can distinguish the two kinds by the smell from their burrows; but he was not apparently aware at the time that a specimen of H. Malabarica with orange quills in the Zoological Gardens in London moulted, and the red quills were replaced by the ordinary black and white ones of the common Indian kind. Dr. Sclater afterwards (see ‘P. Z. S.’ 1871, p. 234) came to the conclusion that H. Malabarica was synonymous with H. leucura.
No. 405. Hystrix (Acanthion) LONGICAUDA.
The Crestless Porcupine (Jerdon’s No. 206).
Native Names.—Anchotia-sahi or Anchotia-dumsi in Nepal; Sathung, Lepcha; O’—e of the Limbus (Hodgson). (N.B.—The ch must not be pronounced as k, but as ch in church.) Anchotia means crestless, the crested porcupine being called Chotia-dumsi.
Habitat.—Nepal and Sikim, and on through Burmah to the Malayan peninsula, where it was first discovered.
Description.—Distinguished from the other species “by its inferior size, total absence of crest on its head, neck, and shoulders, by its longer tail, by the white collar of the neck being evanescent; and lastly by the inferior size and smaller quantity of the spines or quills.”—Hodgson.
It is covered with black spinous bristles from two to three inches long, shortest on the head and limbs. The large quills of the back and croup are from seven to twelve inches long, mostly with one central black ring.
Size.—Head and body, 24 inches; tail, 4, or with the quills, 5½ inches.
This is Hodgson’s H. alophus, which is, I think, a more appropriate name than the one given, for its tail is not so very long in proportion. Hodgson says of it: “They breed in spring, and usually produce two young about the time the crops ripen. They are monogamous, the pair dwelling together in burrows of their own formation. Their flesh is delicious, like pork, but much more delicate flavoured, and they are easily tamed so as to breed in confinement. All tribes and classes, even high-caste Hindoos, eat them, and it is deemed lucky to keep one or two alive in stables, where they are encouraged to breed. Royal stables are seldom without at least one of them.”
This animal was described by Gray as Acanthion Hodgsonii, the lesser Indian porcupine. Waterhouse, in writing of Hystrix (Acanthion) Javanica, says: “The habits of the animal, as recorded by Müller, do not differ from those of H. Hodgsonii”; and Blyth, as mentioned by Jerdon, was of opinion that the two species were one and the same. The Acanthochærus Grotei, described and figured by Dr. Gray in 1866 (‘P. Z. S.’ p. 306), is the same as this species. It is to be found at Darjeeling amongst the tea plantations, between 4000 and 5000 feet elevation.
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