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New World Porcupines
Erethizontidae
The New World porcupines, family Erethizontidae, are large, arboreal rodents, distinguished by their spiny coverings from which they take their name. They inhabit forests and wooded regions across North America and into northern South America. Although both the New World and Old World porcupine families belong to the Hystricognathi branch of the vast order Rodentia, they are quite different and are not particularly closely related.
2 branches of this family, most-observed first · about 19 known species
Neotropical and North American Porcupines
subfamilyErethizontinae
Thin-spined Porcupines
subfamilyChaetomyinae
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
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geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Erethizontidae in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 44010.