The long-tailed armored tree-rat (''Makalata macrura''), is a spiny rat species from

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

. It is found in

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

, with a population in

Ecuador Ecuador, officially the Republic of Ecuador, is a country in northwestern South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and the Pacific Ocean on the west. It also includes the Galápagos Province which contain ...

which is referable either to this species or to ''

Makalata didelphoides The Brazilian spiny tree rat (''Makalata didelphoides'') is a species of rodent in the family Echimyidae. It is found in Bolivia, Brazil, French Guiana, Guyana, Suriname and Venezuela, where it lives in lowland tropical rainforest. There is also ...

''. Initially considered a large form of the latter species, it actually represents a distinct species as supported by morphological and molecular characters. The etymology of the species name derives from the two

ancient greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

words (), meaning "long", and (), meaning "animal tail".

References

Makalata Rodents of Brazil Mammals described in 1842 Taxa named by Johann Andreas Wagner {{Echimyidae-stub