40 Fun Facts About Genet

A camera trap in South Africa filmed a genet riding on a rhinoceros and which other large animal?

Buffalo were the other mounts: the 2014 footage from Hluhluwe–Imfolozi Park showed two different ones carrying the genet. It was the first record of a genet hitch-hiking.

An angry or frightened genet can drive off enemies using a defence best known from which animal?

Skunk tactics work for genets too: an angry, frightened or injured genet can squirt a foul-smelling substance that deters its enemies.

A genet's flexible body can squeeze through any opening that is larger than which part of itself?

Its head is the only limit: the long, lean body behind it is flexible enough to follow through any gap that wide.

A genet's body is usually covered in spots, but which pattern typically marks its long tail?

Rings of dark and pale fur run the length of the tail, and a common genet can carry anywhere from eight to thirteen of them.

Common genets are stealthy hunters of rodents and birds; by which sense do they mainly locate prey?

Scent leads a common genet to its prey, and the bare tip of its nose is important for touch as well as for smell.

What happens to a genet kitten roughly ten days after it is born in its burrow?

Its eyes open at about ten days, as do its ears: both are shut at birth. The first solid food follows at around six weeks.

Genets living near villages are sometimes killed by farmers in retaliation for raiding what?

Poultry is the lure for genets that settle near people, though the same animals help farmers by keeping rats and other vermin down.

Cat-like genets are not cats at all; they share the viverrid family with which musky animals?

Civets are the genets' best-known kin, and both groups carry musk glands whose secretions leave messages for others of their kind.

Solitary, stealthy genets rest in trees or thickets and do most of their hunting at which time?

At night is when genets come alive, with activity peaking just after sunset and again shortly before sunrise.

Most genet species, whatever their spots, have a dark stripe running along which part of the body?

The spine carries the stripe in most genets, and a threatened common genet raises the hair along it into a crest.

Which feature helps a genet climb trees with ease and catch hold of its prey?

Retractable claws, which a genet can draw back partly as a cat does, serve it both for climbing and for catching prey.

Among genets, which adults take on the work of feeding and rearing a litter of kittens?

The mother alone raises the young, because adult genets are solitary and meet only to court. She may have two litters in a year.

Which naturalist gave the common genet its first scientific name, Viverra genetta, in the 1700s?

Carl Linnaeus named the animal in 1758 as a species of Viverra. The separate genus Genetta followed in 1816.

Legend says which Frankish leader founded a knightly Order of the Genet after the Battle of Tours?

Charles Martel is said to have handed captured genet pelts to his commanders. The tale first appears in 1620, with no source given for it.

Common genets were brought to Spain as semi-domestic animals from which region of North Africa?

The Maghreb supplied the genets that crossed the Mediterranean some 1,000 to 1,500 years ago. Their descendants later spread into France.

Genets found east of the Rhône in France are believed to have crossed the river by using what?

Bridges in built-up areas are the likely route. The Rhône had long been thought a barrier that kept the genet from spreading east.

The rare aquatic genet may pat the water's surface with which body part to attract its prey?

Its whiskers may lure prey when tapped on the water, or may simply sense movement below. This genet's sense of smell may be poorly developed.

The rusty-spotted genet was first described from an animal kept in the menagerie at which landmark?

The Tower of London housed the genet that John Edward Gray described in 1830, when the fortress still held a collection of exotic animals.

After reaching mainland Spain, the common genet also spread to which group of Mediterranean islands?

The Balearics took in the genet too, and on Ibiza it is now building work and new roads that break up its habitat.

Which call do common genets use when friendly, as when females summon their litter?

A hiccup signals friendliness and is also used by courting males, whereas a genet that utters a click is making a threat.

What shape are the pupils of a genet, set in irises about the same colour as its fur?

Elliptical pupils add to the cat-like look, and a genet can also swivel its large ears through about 80 degrees.

Which term describes the rare all-black genets on record, like the big cats called black panthers?

Melanistic genets have an excess of dark pigment in their fur, and one such common genet was recorded in southern Portugal in 2019.

Alongside leopards and servals, which birds are named among African predators of the common genet?

Owls of the bigger species share the list with caracals and honey badgers, and the red fox and Eurasian goshawk are possible threats as well.

The Abyssinian genet takes its name from Abyssinia, the old name for which African country?

Ethiopia is where this little-known genet has been seen as high as 3,750 metres, in the Abune Yosef massif.

A servaline genet unknown to science until 1995 is found only on which Indian Ocean island?

Zanzibar has a genet of its own, which came to light when one was killed near the Jozani forest. None was caught on camera until 2003.

Bourlon's genet of West Africa is named after Philippe Bourlon, who did which job in Paris?

Zookeeper Philippe Bourlon worked at the Paris Zoological Park, and the genet named in his honour was recognised as a species only in 2003.

Most genet species hold which conservation status on the IUCN Red List?

Least Concern covers most genets, though a few are so poorly known that they are rated Data Deficient: nobody can tell how they are faring.

An extinct genet that died out after humans arrived was found only on which Mediterranean island?

Cyprus had a genet of its own until roughly 11,000 years ago. It was about the size of a common genet, with teeth suited to a meatier diet.

Which small rodent, widespread across Europe, is described as a favourite prey of the common genet?

Wood mouse tops the menu, but the diet is broad: lizards, birds, eggs, scorpions, centipedes and fruit such as olives are all taken.

DNA studies show the genets' closest relatives are the two oyans, also known as African what?

Linsangs from Africa are true viverrids and sister to the genets, whereas the look-alike Asiatic kind may be closer kin to the cats.

Which species of genet, described from a single skin from Bioko, has not been recorded since 1946?

King genet records stop in 1946, so nobody can say how the species is doing, and the Red List rates it Data Deficient.

The common genet's French range was long thought to be bounded by the Rhône and which other river?

The Loire was believed to stop the genet spreading north, while the Rhône did the same to the east until genets turned up beyond it.

Lowe's servaline genet, known from one old skin, was first photographed in 2002 in which country?

Tanzania's Udzungwa Mountains yielded both the skin, collected in 1932, and the photograph taken seventy years later.

The rare aquatic genet is thought to live in an African reserve named after which forest animal?

Okapi Wildlife Reserve lies in the one region where this genet has been recorded. Science knows it from only about 30 museum specimens.

Which cat-like predator of Madagascar was once classified in the genet's family, the viverrids?

Fossa DNA later placed the animal in a separate family, the Eupleridae, made up solely of Madagascar's own predators.

The Angolan genet is also called the miombo genet; miombo is a type of what in southern Africa?

Woodland dominated by Brachystegia trees is called miombo, a word from the Bemba language, and this genet roams it from Angola to Mozambique.

Cape genets sometimes eat which plant material, which may aid digestion and dislodge swallowed hair?

Grass has been found in the stomachs of Cape genets alongside rodents and beetles, and they even scavenge dead fish on the beach.

Johnston's genet of West Africa has teeth adapted for a diet made up mainly of what?

Insects are thought to be the mainstay of this golden-furred forest genet, which was not captured alive until the year 2000.

Which shaggy Asian tree-dweller, nicknamed the bearcat, belongs to the same family as the genets?

Binturong and genet are both viverrids, though the bearcat lives far away in the forests of South and Southeast Asia.

The genet's family, as first defined in 1821, also included Herpestes, a genus of which animals?

Mongooses, meerkats among them, were grouped with genets at first. They now have a family of their own, the Herpestidae.