Abstract
IT is well enough known that carnivorous and other—especially nocturnal—animals are provided with numerous long hairs, generally called vibrissæ, upon various regions of the face. The “whiskers” of the cat are a familiar example. But it is not so widely known that there exists very commonly in those same creatures a tuft of long hairs upon the wrist, which are connected with a large nerve. There have been incidental references to these structures; thus Mr. Bland Sutton described and figured them in several Lemurs. But it is not, I believe, a matter of common knowledge that they are present in a great variety of mammals. I have examined members of the groups, Lemuroidea, Carnivora, Rodents, and Marsupials, and invariably found these structures in those members of the groups in question which use their forepaws as climbing or grasping organs, or in both ways. They are generally not very conspicuous, as the individual hairs are often not markedly thicker than those of the surrounding fur. But often they contrast by their colour. In a pale, almost albino, example of the squirrel Sciurus maximus, the hairs were especially obvious, owing to their being black, and thus contrasting with the pale brown of the surrounding part of the pelage. In a black cat the same vibrissæ were white. It is always, however, easy to assure oneself of their presence by the sense of touch. The bundle of these rather stiff hairs and the thick nerve termination cannot be missed, if the skin be gently squeezed. In a newly born phalanger this structure was particularly obvious; but in a kangaroo of corresponding age there were no signs of an elevation of the skin bearing thick hairs. It will be remembered that the mode of life of these two marsupials is very different. Although I have examined up to the present but few genera of mammals, it appears to me that this structure will be found to be pretty universal. I have of course not detected these arm vibrissæ in Ungulates.
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BEDDARD, F. Vibrissæ on the Forepaws of Mammals. Nature 62, 523 (1900). https://doi.org/10.1038/062523a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/062523a0
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