Do you have a Northern or Southern Tamandua? (More questions in details)?

In fact, the southern tamandua is quite clumsy on the ground and ambles along, incapable of the gallop that its relative, the giant anteater, can achieve. The southern tamandua uses its powerful forearms in self-defense. If it is threatened in a tree it grasps a branch with its hindfeet and tail, leaving its arms and long, curved claws free for combat.

If attacked on the ground, this anteater backs up against a rock or a tree and grabs the opponent with its forearms. In the rainforest, the southern tamandua is surrounded during the day by a cloud of flies and mosquitoes and is often seen wiping these insects from its eyes. Citation needed This animal has small eyes and poor vision, but its large, upright ears indicate that hearing is an important sense.

Southern tamanduas eat ants and termites in roughly equal proportions, although they may also eat a small quantity of fruit. They locate their food by scent, and prey on a wide range of species, including army ants, carpenter ants, and Nasutitermes. 4 They avoid eating ants that are armed with strong chemical defenses, such as leaf-eating antscitation needed.

Tamanduas are also thoughtby whom? To eat honey and bees and, in captivity, have been known to eat fruit and meat as well. Anteaters extract their prey by using their extremely strong forelimbs to rip open nests and their elongated snouts and rounded tongues (up to 40 centimetres (16 in) in length) to lick up the insects.

Although it has the same diet as the giant anteater, both animals are able to live alongside one another, perhaps because the southern tamandua is able to reach nests in trees, while its larger cousin cannot. The southern anteater is listed as CITES Appendix II in southeastern Brazil. Although widespread, they are uncommon.

They are killed by hunters, who claim that tamanduas kill dogs. They are also killed for the thick tendons in their tails, from which rope is made. Tamanduas are sometimes used by Amazonian Indians to rid their homes of ants and termites.

Emmons and Francois Feer, 1997 - Neotropical Rainforest Mammals, A Field Guide. "Tamandua tetradactyla" from Animal Diversity Web.