Little known animals : the Woolly flying squirrel

[vogelcommando]

To be honest, I had never heared of it before :

On the trail of the world's largest glider

 

[Chlidonias]

that's another one of those animals I have wanted to see since I was a kid and read about them in Walker's Mammals of the World. The woolly flying squirrel and the Flores giant rat were the main two. I had always wondered about the photo used in Walker's - it is the 1924 one mentioned in this article.

 

[Surroundx]

There's a genus of two species of even more enigmatic flying squirrels:

http://www.mapress.com/zootaxa/2013/f/z03686p481f.pdf

 

[SealPup]

I thought the world's largest glider was the greater glider.

 

[Surroundx]

I thought the world's largest glider was the greater glider.

The woolly flying squirrel and gliding: does size matter?

 

[SealPup]

Probably the greater glider was the largest before the woolly flying squirrels rediscovery. The hypsodont teeth of the squirrel might have led to an assumption it is a terrestrial grazer? And therefore unable to launch.

 

[Chlidonias]

I thought the world's largest glider was the greater glider.

only the largest gliding marsupial. I don't think anybody has ever suggested the woolly flying squirrel couldn't glide.