Q 01/05

The aye-aye uses its long middle finger for which very human bad habit, reaching almost to its throat?

A) Biting its nails

B) Picking its nose

C) Cracking its knuckles

D) Sucking its thumb

Answer · why

B) Picking its nose

Picking its nose is a real aye-aye habit: the thin third finger slides in through a nostril and can reach the throat. The animal then eats whatever it...

Q 02/05

Madagascar has none of which birds, whose job of digging grubs out of tree trunks the aye-aye does instead?

A) Parrots

B) Kingfishers

C) Woodpeckers

D) Cuckoos

Answer · why

C) Woodpeckers

Woodpeckers never reached Madagascar, so the aye-aye fills their niche. It gnaws into the trunk with its front teeth and pulls out larvae with one thi...

Q 03/05

Ever-growing front teeth got the aye-aye wrongly classified at first among which group of mammals?

A) Shrews

B) Sloths

C) Anteaters

D) Rodents

Answer · why

D) Rodents

Rodents seemed the obvious fit to early naturalists, who filed the aye-aye as a kind of squirrel. No other living primate has teeth that grow througho...

Q 04/05

In Malagasy folk belief, a person pointed at by an aye-aye's thin middle finger is marked for what?

A) Blindness

B) Death

C) Madness

D) Poverty

Answer · why

B) Death

Death is what the pointing finger is said to bring, which is why aye-ayes are often killed on sight. The superstition is one of the main threats to th...

Q 05/05

Scientists found that the aye-aye has a hidden pseudothumb, an extra digit also found on which animal's paw?

A) Raccoon

B) Sea otter

C) Giant panda

D) Honey badger

Answer · why

C) Giant panda

Giant panda paws carry the same kind of pseudothumb, built from a wrist bone. The aye-aye's version has three muscles to move it and even its own fing...