The mouse possum may be the cutest of last year’s new species

Human it’s good to go to the forest sometimes. You can even find a new animal there.

That’s what happened to an assistant professor at Humboldt University in California Silvia to Pavan. He traveled to Peru’s Perucas to look for a squirrel, but an opossum pawed at him. Precisely mouse opossumunprecedented in its mousey opossum.

The unprecedentedness of Otus was confirmed this fall, when it could be stated that no one, except for Pavan, had really seen the animal in question before.

The new species got its name Marmosa Chachapoya. It might be the cutest of new animal species discovered last year.

The round-eyed muzzle fits in the palm of your hand. It is only ten centimeters long. However, it still has a 16-centimeter tail behind it.

The name of the species comes from the Chachapoyas Indians, who lived in the mountains of Peru long before the Inca Empire.

Mouse possums are marsupials, such as kangaroos. After birth, the little chicks crawl into their mother’s stomach pouch, where they grow.

Not much is known about this mouse opossum, because the individual shown in the pictures is the only representative of its species found. Its guys adventure in the hiding places of the misty cloud forests of the Peruvian mountains and probably eat insects and other creatures smaller than themselves.

The opossum tribe is not known for being great fighters. When danger threatens, they flip over and pretend to be dead.

They even emit a bad smell to make the impression of a rotting carcass complete. This defense mechanism has been inherited by several mouse opossums, perhaps this one as well.

Christmas at the from the University of Arizona we heard good news. Even though nature loss is raging, new species are still discovered every year more than they die out.

Of course, it does not mean that new species develop so quickly, but a huge amount of nature has yet to be discovered. According to the study, up to 16,000 new species are recorded every year. Most of these are insects, plants and fungi. New mammals are rarely found.

The first mouse opossum was recorded in the books of science by a Swede Carl Linnaeus, who developed the entire system of naming organisms. In 1758, Linné named that mouse opossum Murine marble.

Despite its name, it does not growl.

Correction January 5 at 2:21 p.m.: The mouse possum’s tail was 16 centimeters long, not 15. Researcher Silvia Pavani is an assistant professor, not a professor.