Southern Monito del Monte

Fascinating facts about the Southern Monito del Monte

• A creature the size of a mouse with a marsupial pouch lived in South American rainforests for 80 million years, surviving the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs — and then vanished from the fossil record until 1894, when a Chilean naturalist discovered it still alive in the cloud forests of the Andes. Dromiciops gliroides is a living fossil, the sole survivor of an entire order that dominated the Southern Hemisphere before kangaroos and koalas evolved.
• Unlike kangaroos or koalas, this thumb-sized marsupial cannot regulate its own body temperature — it enters torpor, dropping its core temperature from 37°C to just 10°C on cold nights to conserve energy. Over winter it hibernates in a nest woven from bark and leaves, burning through fat reserves it built during autumn fruit binges. It is one of only two living marsupials on Earth that genuinely hibernates.
• Its tail is not for balance or fat storage like other marsupials — it is a sensory organ packed with whisker-like hairs that the monito del monte uses to navigate pitch-black rainforest understory at night, feeling its way across branches the way a cat reads a room. The tail can support its entire body weight, and it is prehensile enough to grip a twig while the animal feeds one-handed.
• In 1975, scientists believed this species was extinct, wiped out by habitat loss in the Chilean temperate rainforest. Then a single population of fewer than 100 animals was found clinging to survival in a remote reserve. Today fewer than 2,000 are thought to remain in fragmented pockets of forest, making it one of South America's least-known and most threatened carnivorous marsupials.
• Its pouch faces backwards — opening toward the tail instead of the belly — a feature no other living marsupial shares. This geometry allows the mother to carry her joey while climbing and foraging through dense vegetation without the pouch catching on branches, a design perfected over 80 million years of life in thick forest canopy.

At a glance

About the Southern Monito del Monte

In the misty, temperate rainforests of South America, the Southern Monito del Monte navigates its arboreal realm with an air of quiet purpose, its large, round eyes drinking in the dappled light that filters through the canopy above. As it moves through the trees, its soft, greyish-brown fur blending seamlessly into the shadows, this tiny, opossum-like marsupial embodies a unique blend of adaptability and reclusiveness, its very existence a testament to the secrets that still linger in the unexplored recesses of our planet. With its ability to survive in a variety of habitats, from dense forest to open scrubland, the Monito del Monte is a remarkable example of resilience in a rapidly changing world.

Discover more wildlife