mongoose

(also very rarely with the spelling: ‘mungoose’; plural – ‘mongooses’ and also ‘mongeese’ — for the right pronunciation, please click here)

a kind of animals – four-legged – meat-eating – long body with brown or grey or greyish-brown, narrow head with small rounded ears, long snout (= mouth and nose part), round clear eyes, short legs with long strong claws, long thick tail; size:1-4 feet long with 6 inches to 1 foot tail, and weight: 250 grams to 4 Kg; feeds on (eats) insects, crabs, worms, earthworms, lizards, snails, mice, rats, scorpions, and some fruit; lives for 12-20 years; about 30 species found in Asia, Africa, southern Europe and some Caribbean islands

Male ~ male

female ~ female

baby ~ mongpoe (very young); pup (little grown-up)

group ~ pack; business; troop (while hunting in groups)

call/sound ~ ‘giggle’ (?, during mating season)

home ~ burrow (not made by themselves, but abandoned by other animals)

Some common mongooses are: grey mongoose, banded mongoose, dwarf mongoose, Egyptian mongoose, European mongoose

Special Features:
The ‘meerkats’ or ‘suricats’ also belong to mongooses.

Though ‘mongoose’ has ‘goose’ in it, the name of a large duck-like bird, it has no relation whatsoever to the bird. The name ‘mongoose’ is believed to be from Telugu, Marathi and Kannada languages, different forms of the Dravidian language of South India.

Mongooses are useful animals; they keep the number of pest animals (vermin), such as mice, rats, scorpions and snakes under control by eating them.

a mongoose & snake fight

Mongooses have resistance to snake venom; they are not affected even by the cobra venom (= poison); and when a mongoose and a cobra fight, most often, the mongoose’s speed and the thick fur protect it from the snake bite.

In ancient Egyptian culture, the mongoose was worshipped for its ability to kill snakes and eat away the crocodile eggs. It was pet-named “Pharaoh’s mouse”!

In India and in some other parts in Asia, snake charmers showing mock fights between cobras (snakes) and mongooses used to be a common sight until recently. In fact, in Okinawa province of Japan, there are special shows of mock fights between cobras and mongoose arranged to entertain tourists!

Mongooses are mentioned in children stories and in some motion pictures.

The lead character in the most popular children story “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi”, written by Rudyard Kipling, a British writer born in India, is a mongoose!

Some people keep mongooses as pets!!