Adorable Meerkats Lead Social Lives
Meerkats are adorable mammals in the mongoose family. The mongoose family consists of small, cat-like animals such as the Marsh Mongoose, the Flat-Headed Kusimanse, the Bushy-Tailed Mongoose, and many others. Yet, even though meerkats are cat-like animals, and "kat" is part of their name, meerkats are not cats. In fact, unlike many types of cats, they are very social and prefer living in large groups, called mobs or gangs.
Meerkats work together to take care of the whole mob. They share the responsibilities of raising the kits, and watching out for predators. They even work together as a team to fight off enemies when necessary. Meerkats need one another.
Like most living things, meerkats are well adapted to living where they do. This page will tell you about some of the things that make meerkats unique. There are also several meerkat items (DVDs, clothing, plush animals, figurines, etc.) for sale here.
What You'll Find On This Page
All About Meerkats
What Do Meerkats Look Like?
Where Do Meerkats Live?
How Do Meerkats Survive In the Dry Savanna?
What Do Meerkats Eat And Drink?
Baby Meerkats Are Called Kits Or Pups.
Meerkats Can Close Their Ears Without Using Their Paws!
Sentries Are Look-Outs For The Rest Of The Mob.
More Photos And Information About Meerkats
Meerkats are able to easily sit up, as well as stand on two or four legs.
Meerkats dig burrows in the sand.
Photo credit: Katie Tegtmeyer
Look at those claws!
My dinner's in here somewhere!
Meerkats use their tails to help them balance.
Even More Meerkat Photos
Meerkats On Youtube
Baby meerkats explore the African wild.
Meerkat Manor - Babysitting and Foraging
Items For Sale
Meerkat Manor on eBay
Meerkat Figurines And Toys
Plush Meerkats
Books On Meerkats
Meerkat Clothing and Calendars
More Meerkat Items
For More Information
Meerkat Resources
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What do Meerkats Look Like?
Meerkats have brown and gray fur. They are about 12 inches tall when standing up on two legs, and 6 inches tall when they are on all fours. They weigh only a few pounds and are about the size of a squirrel. They have pointed black noses and black rings around their eyes. Their ears and the tips of their tails are dark. Dark horizontal stripes cross their backs. Each foot has four toes. Their long tail helps them balance when they are standing up on two legs.
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Meerkats are able to easily sit up, as well as stand on two or four legs.
Where do Meerkats Live?
Meerkats live in South Africa, the bottom-most tip of Africa.
The savanna in South Africa is the home to meerkats. There is mostly dry grass in this area. There are not many trees or other plants. There is very little shade, and not much water either, because it doesn't rain very often. Temperatures range from freezing to 122 F!
Here is some more information about the African Savanna.
The photo above is Kruger Park in South Africa.
Photo Credit : © Nicolas Raymond
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What You'll Find On This Page
Meerkats dig burrows in the sand.
How Do Meerkats Survive In the Dry Savanna?
Because there are not many trees or caves on the savanna, meerkats lives in underground burrows. Sometimes they use the burrows of other types of animals. Other times they actually share burrows with other types of animals who are still living in them! But most often they dig their own burrows. They have long claws for digging in the hard desert soil and are able to dig burrows 5 to 10 feet deep in the ground, which helps them stay cool during the day and warm at night.
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Look at those claws!
What Do Meerkats Eat And Drink?
Guess what their FAVORITE food is!
Meerkats eat both plants and animals. They enjoy fruits, roots of plants, and eggs. They eat various types of bugs, such as termites, beetles, centipedes, and grubs, as well as worms and snails. They also eat mice, birds, lizards, and snakes, which they kill by biting and shaking them.
But guess what their favorite food is! The scorpion!! It isn't that scorpion venom doesn't bother meerkats at all, as is commonly believed. Instead, Meerkats have developed a technique which keeps them safe while allowing them to enjoy the tasty treat of a scorpion. They first bite off the tail of the scorpion, and then drag the scorpion's body through the sand to remove any traces of venom on the exoskeleton! Thus, they can eat scorpions without being bitten! Baby meerkats are not born knowing how to carry out this technique, and so other members of the mob teach them, one step at a time. For more information on how meerkats eat scorpions, you may wish to visit: Are meerkats immune to poison?, by Josh Clark.
Like all living things, meerkats need water. But water is often hard to find in the savanna! Sometimes they find water in streams or puddles, but they get most of their water from their food.
The clip art of the scorpion in this section comes from: Free Clip Art Now.
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What You'll Find On This Page
My dinner's in here somewhere!
Meerkats Can Close Their Ears Without Using Their Paws!
When meerkats smell some prey under the ground, they rapidly start digging! And boy do they dig! In only a few seconds, they can dig up as much dirt as they weigh! Because dirt flies everywhere as they dig, they often close their ears to keep the dirt out of them!
The text is in French, but I found a website which shows two photos clearly highlighting the difference in meerkats' ears when they are closed and when they are open. (After you click the link, scroll down to see the two photos of a meerkat's ears.)
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Baby Meerkats Are Called Kits Or Pups.
Photo credit: Tambako
Baby meerkats can be called either kits or pups. They are born unable to see or hear, and can't even move around much at first. They stay in an underground den until they are three to four weeks old.
Kits have babysitters to watch after them and keep them safe. The babysitters can lose up to 2% of their weight in a day of babysitting, from not being able to hunt for food! They do this to allow the new mother a chance to hunt and eat. She must eat, or she won't be able to nurse her babies!
When they are older, young meerkats each get their own teacher. Teachers show them everything they need to know about being meerkats, including how to safely eat scorpions.
Photo credit: Meerkats Wiki
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Adorable baby meerkats explore the African wild for the first time - BBC wildlife
These meerkat kits are just coming out of their den for the first time!
Adorable baby meerkats explore the African wild for the first time - BBC wildlife
What You'll Find On This Page
Meerkat Manor - Babysitting and Foraging
Click on the image in order to watch the youtube full size.
Meerkat Manor - Babysitting and Foraging
Sentries Are Look-Outs For The Rest Of The Mob.
Adults meerkats take turns being guards, called sentries or look-outs, as the other meerkats in the mob hunt for food.They climb small trees or stand on piles of dirt or rocks in order to be able to see better. Their job is to protect the mob.
When they see a predator coming, the sentry makes a loud barking sound. As the predator gets closer, the barking gets louder. The other meerkats hear it and run inside their burrows. If necessary, sentries sometimes dig up dirt to make clouds of dust to allow the other meerkats and themselves a chance to escape.
Sometimes meerkats work together to fight off a predator.They stay close together and try to look like one large animal. They puff up their fur and hold their tails high in the air, while charging and hissing at the predator. If the predator doesn't go away, they lie on their backs and bite and scratch the enemy!
Photo credits: Sentry photo above - Public Domain Pictures
Meerkat standing on two legs, below - morguefile.com.
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Meerkats use their tails to help them balance when they're standing up on two legs.
More Meerkat Photos
(Click on a picture to enlarge it.)
Burrow
Reclining meerkats
meerkat look-out
Meerkat drinking water
Baby meerkat
What You'll Find On This Page
Meerkat Resources
For more information about meerkats!
Websites:Animals : Ndoki Forest : Slender-tailed Meerkat.
Learning About Meerkats.
Meerkat - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Meerkat info.
Official Meerkat Information
San Diego Zoo's Animal Bytes: Meerkat.
Books:
Moore, Heidi. A Mob of Meerkats (Animal Groups). Chicago: Heinemann, 2004.
Jackson, Tom. Animal Families: Meerkats. Danbury, CT: Grolier Educational, 2001.
Storad, Conrad J. Meerkats (Early Bird Nature Books). Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, 2006.
Magazines:
Schleichert, Elizabeth. "Meet The Meerkats." Ranger Rick July 2005: 22-27.
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Meerkat Manor on eBay
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Meerkat Figurines, Toys, And Stuffed Animals For Sale
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Meerkat Books, Clothing, Calendars, and More
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- theraggededge theraggededge Dec 2, 2009 @ 7:14 am
- Adorable... and very tough little animals. There's a great advert running in the UK at the moment for a website called 'ComparetheMarket.com'. They have based it on something called 'Comparethemeerkat.com' with Russian (?) meerkats. It'll be on YouTube. Simples!
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- Anonym Anonym Nov 4, 2009 @ 3:45 am
- Im from denmark and i shall whrite about meerkats on english :)
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- calicoskies calicoskies Jul 22, 2009 @ 7:19 pm
- Awwwww! I love Meerkats :) This is a great lens!
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- GonnaFly GonnaFly Jul 6, 2009 @ 6:29 pm
- Excellent 5* lens. We watched Meerkat Manor on TV a while ago and it was absolutely fascinating - almost like a soap opera :-) I love these creatures!
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- ajgodinho ajgodinho Jun 23, 2009 @ 10:26 am
- Nice lens., very well done..I didn't know much about Meerkats...now I do...thanks!
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- ElizabethJeanAllen ElizabethJeanAllen May 19, 2009 @ 8:28 pm
- Hi,
My name is Elizabeth Jean Allen and I am the new group leader for the Nature and the Outdoors Group.
Lizzy
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- draik draik May 18, 2009 @ 8:17 am
- Thanks for joining All About Animals Group. Your lens was added to our feature module and it will appear randomly.
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- tandemonimom tandemonimom May 5, 2009 @ 4:00 pm
- This is a great lens! Welcome to The Homeschooling Group!
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- enslavedbyfaeries enslavedbyfaeries May 4, 2009 @ 9:44 am
- Amazing information about meerkats! I learned a lot here and was very surprised to find out that they eat scorpions. Welcome to the Squid Kids group. :)
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- Cari_Kay Cari_Kay May 4, 2009 @ 1:41 am
- My son is a huge MeerKat fan. He loves MeerKat manor and has several stuffed meerkats, the calendar and even a photoshopped picture of him hanging out with some meerkats. I'll have to show him this!
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- OhMe OhMe May 3, 2009 @ 3:59 pm
- Great work here. I sure learned a lot about Meerkats. I love your links with your table of contents. Welcome to the South Carolina Group.
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- Barkely Barkely May 3, 2009 @ 3:39 pm
- Meerkats are such interesting creatures. Thanks for adding this lens to the Fun For Kids group:-)
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