Nyctereutes procyonoides

Small in size, with disproportionately short legs, it looks like a fox. It has a distinct facial pattern like the North American raccoon (procyon lotor). The forehead and muzzle are white, and the area around the eyes is black. The cheeks are covered with fluffy long hair, forming a ring-shaped collar; there is a cross-shaped pattern on the front of the back; the chest, legs and feet are dark brown. The body is generally short and thick, with a tail length less than 33% of the head and body length, and covered with fluffy hair. The tips of the hair on the back and tail are black; the back hair is light brown-gray, mixed with black hair tips. The skull outline is flat; the nasal bone is sharp near 1/3, with a sudden depression; the parietal bone is wrinkled, with a ridge close to the sagittal ridge at the back of the skull; adults have obvious herringbone ridges; the lower jaw has a special secondary angular process; the median pterygoid foramen extends beyond the teeth.
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Origin: China, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Russia, Vietnam.
Introduced: Austria, Belarus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine.
Origin unknown: Uzbekistan.
It lives in plains, hills and some mountainous areas, and crosses the subarctic to subtropical regions. It lives in river valleys, grasslands and jungles near rivers, streams and lakes. It lives in caves, most of which are open-air. It often uses abandoned old caves of other animals, or nests in stone crevices and tree holes.

Raccoon dog is a very ancient species of Canidae, considered to be a species similar to the ancestor of Canidae, with 6 subspecies.

貉 generally hide in caves during the day and come out at night. In summer, raccoons live in cool stone caves; in other seasons, except for giving birth, they generally do not use caves, but hide not far from caves. They live alone or in groups of 3 to 5. When they are in groups, they forage in pairs as a family unit, and their home range is 5 to 10 km².

The raccoon dog is not as agile as jackals and foxes, but is more docile, has a low voice, and can climb trees and swim. Those distributed in the north often sleep non-continuously in winter (from the beginning of winter to the beginning of snow), that is, they sleep in caves and do not come out. However, unlike true hibernation, they often come out to move around in melting snow. This habit of winter sleep is unique to raccoon dogs among canids. The footprints of raccoon dogs are arranged in pairs like small chains. Natural enemies include wolves, lynxes, etc.

Indirect measurement (obtaining population density by the number of deaths per kilometer on national highways) shows that the population of raccoon dogs is high in southwestern Japan (Kyushu, Shikoku, etc.), while the population in Hokkaido, central Japan, and especially in urban areas is low. There are more in Japan, but they have become extinct in some places in China.

Listed in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species: Least Concern (LC), assessed in 2008.

Listed in the second level of the List of National Key Protected Wildlife in China.

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