📷 LeaMaimone · Public domain
📷 Norbert Potensky
📷 Cephas
IUCN: Least Concern
North American Porcupine
Erethizon dorsatum
KingdomAnimalia›PhylumChordata›ClassMammalia›OrderRodentia›FamilyErethizontidae›GenusErethizon
About
The North American porcupine carries up to 30,000 barbed quills that detach on contact but cannot be thrown. Its winter diet of bark makes it one of the few mammals able to live off trees through the boreal cold. Fishers are among the few predators able to flip and kill them; porcupines otherwise climb and sit quietly in canopy feeding trees, largely unhurried.
Key Facts
⛰Habitat Coniferous and mixed forest, tundra, and desert scrub
🍃Diet Herbivore — bark, twigs, leaves, and cambium in winter; forbs and fruit in summer
📏Size & Weight Body 60–90 cm; tail 15–30 cm
•weight 3.5–18 kg
⏳Lifespan Up to 18 years
🗺Range Canada, Alaska, and much of the western and northeastern United States
MammalRodent
Key Facts
⛰Habitat Coniferous and mixed forest, tundra, and desert scrub
🍃Diet Herbivore — bark, twigs, leaves, and cambium in winter; forbs and fruit in summer
📏Size & Weight Body 60–90 cm; tail 15–30 cm
•weight 3.5–18 kg
⏳Lifespan Up to 18 years
🗺Range Canada, Alaska, and much of the western and northeastern United States
Photo Credits
#1LeaMaimone · Public domain
#2Norbert Potensky · CC BY-SA 3.0
#3Cephas · CC BY-SA 3.0
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