The painted treeshrew (''Tupaia picta'') is a

treeshrew The treeshrews (also called tree shrews or banxrings) are small mammals native to the tropical forests of South and Southeast Asia. They make up the entire order Scandentia (from Latin ''scandere'', "to climb"), which split into two families: the ...

species of the family

Tupaiidae Tupaiidae is one of two families of treeshrews, the other family being Ptilocercidae. The family contains three living genera and 19 living species. The family name derives from ''tupai'', the Malay word for treeshrew and also for squirrel which ...

. The first specimen was described by

Oldfield Thomas Michael Rogers Oldfield Thomas (21 February 1858 – 16 June 1929) was a British zoologist. Career Thomas worked at the Natural History Museum, London, Natural History Museum on mammals, describing about 2,000 new species and subspecies for ...

and was part of a zoological collection from northern

Borneo Borneo () is the List of islands by area, third-largest island in the world, with an area of , and population of 23,053,723 (2020 national censuses). Situated at the geographic centre of Maritime Southeast Asia, it is one of the Greater Sunda ...

obtained by the

British Museum of Natural History The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum (Lo ...

Characteristics

The painted treeshrew has a body length of a little bit over and a slightly shorter tail length, making it one of the smaller treeshrews in its genus. Most of its body is a rather dull color compared to other related species, consisting of mostly grayish olive, with a few yellow spots. However, its chin and chest are brighter colored, consisting of mostly orange and yellow. It also has a black stripe on its back.

Distribution and habitat

The painted treeshrew is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

and inhabits the forests of

Brunei Brunei, officially Brunei Darussalam, is a country in Southeast Asia, situated on the northern coast of the island of Borneo. Apart from its coastline on the South China Sea, it is completely surrounded by the Malaysian state of Sarawak, with ...

Kalimantan Kalimantan (; ) is the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo. It constitutes 73% of the island's area, and consists of the provinces of Central Kalimantan, East Kalimantan, North Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, and West Kalimantan. The non-Ind ...

, and

Sarawak Sarawak ( , ) is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia. It is the largest among the 13 states, with an area almost equal to that of Peninsular Malaysia. Sarawak is located in East Malaysia in northwest Borneo, and is ...

. It usually lives at lower elevations, below , but some specimens have been found at elevations hundreds of meters higher. Although the painted treeshrew is not a threatened species, it still suffers from

loss of habitat Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss or habitat reduction) occurs when a natural habitat is no longer able to support its native species. The organisms once living there have either moved elsewhere, or are dead, leading to a decrease ...

Behaviour and ecology

The painted treeshrew's diet consists mainly of fruits and insects.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1763907 Treeshrews Mammals of Brunei Mammals of Indonesia Mammals of Malaysia Mammals of Borneo Endemic fauna of Borneo Mammals described in 1892 Taxa named by Oldfield Thomas Taxonomy articles created by Polbot