These are Palm Civet Cats or Musang as they are called here. Look one up on the internet and you will find many interesting facts on them. Like the scent from their scent glands are used by many big perfume manufcturers, or in some countries they are fed coffee cherries, then when expelled, the coffee beans are ground up and sold at over $100 a pound for the coffee. When scared or threatened, they can in fact spray just a like a skunk. They are very viscious in the wild, and eat almost anything, from bugs to mammals,to birds.
They also have a prehensial tail that they use for balance and climbing. They are also nocturnal which means they feed at night primarily.
I have one that just came in that was snared and needs a leg amputated. I will post the gruesome pics at a later date, just to show how abused these guys are. They are snared and the legs become so infected they die, or there is a sap from a tree here, that they spread on tree branches that acts as a glue. When the musangs are pulled from the glue, it litterally rips the pads off their feet. Not a pleasant site and definately very hard to treat.
click the photos to enlarge. |
