Javelina

Tayassu Tajacu

Donor: Dan Fenske

Javelina are medium sized animals that look like wild boar. They are also known as collared peccary. These pigs can be found in the deserts of southeast Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, southward through Mexico and Central America and into northern Argentina. They have a ruffed collar and short salt and pepper hair. As they are herbivores, their diet consists of native plant foods such as agave, mesquite beans, and prickly pear, as well as roots, tubers, and other green vegetation. The main predators of Javelina are mountain lions, humans coyotes, bobcats and jaguars.

Although Javelina have small tusks, they are not for cleaving through meat. Rather, javelina teeth are mad for crushing hard seeds and chewing through tough grasses. They are also used for warning off predators who would attack them. They do this by chattering their tusks together in warning. They also form herds to be used as protection. These herds are recorded to become as large as 100 individuals!