Sulawesi Babirusa

Fascinating facts about the Sulawesi Babirusa

• A North Sulawesi babirusa can stretch up to a meter long. Its head-and-body length ranges from 85-110 cm (33-43 in) and it can tip the scales at up to 100 kg (220 lb). That bulk, paired with its near-hairless skin, lets it push through dense underbrush while staying camouflaged in the mottled forest floor.
• Babirusas belong to a lineage that split from warthogs tens of millions of years ago, making them living fossils of the pig family. Scientists place the divergence of the subfamily Babyrousinae from the warthog branch in the Oligocene or early Miocene.
• In 2006 a male North Sulawesi babirusa and a domestic pig at Copenhagen Zoo produced five hybrid piglets, but none could reproduce. The accidental cross yielded five piglets, two of which died from injuries inflicted by their mother, and the surviving three were found to be infertile.
• Male babirusas grow tusks so extreme they actually pierce their own skulls. The upper canines curve backward until they break through the top of the snout, then keep growing until they puncture the bone of the skull itself.
• The babirusa faces a double threat from illegal hunting and forest loss, despite legal protection in Indonesia. Its habitat of tropical forest underbrush, riverbanks, and canebrakes is being cleared.

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.

• Wikipedia

At a glance

About the Sulawesi Babirusa

In the lush, tropical forests of Sulawesi, the babirusa roams with an air of quiet confidence, its tusks, which curve upwards like scimitars, glinting in dappled sunlight as it navigates the underbrush with deliberate, unhurried steps. As it moves, the babirusa's distinctive snout twitches, sensing the scents of its surroundings, a testament to its remarkable adaptability in a habitat where competition for resources is fierce. With its unique appearance and elusive nature, the babirusa remains an enigmatic figure, a true marvel of evolutionary ingenuity in one of the most biodiverse regions on the planet.

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