Meerkat

The meerkat is a small mongoose of slim build characterised by a broad head, large eyes, a pointed snout, long legs, a thin tapering tail, and a brindled coat pattern. It is smaller than most other mongooses except the dwarf mongooses (genus Helogale) and possibly Galerella species. The head-and-body length is around 24–35 cm (9.4–13.8 in), and the weight has been recorded to be between 0.62–0.97 kg (1.4–2.1 lb) without much variation between the sexes (though some dominant females can be heavier than the rest). The soft coat is light grey to yellowish brown with alternate, poorly defined light and dark bands on the back. Individuals from the southern part of the range tend to be darker. The guard hairs, light at the base, have two dark rings and are tipped with black or silvery white; several such hairs aligned together give rise to the coat pattern. These hairs are typically between 1.5 and 2 cm (0.59 and 0.79 in), but measure 3–4 cm (1.2–1.6 in) on the flanks. Its head is mostly white, and the underparts are covered sparsely with dark reddish-brown fur, with the dark skin underneath showing through. The eyes, in sockets covering over 20% of the skull length, are capable of binocular vision. The slim, yellowish tail, unlike the bushy tails of many other mongooses, measures 17 to 25 cm (6.7 to 9.8 in), and is tipped with black. Females have six nipples. …

The meerkat occurs in southwestern Botswana, western and southern Namibia, northern and western South Africa; the range barely extends into southwestern Angola. It lives in areas with stony, often calcareous ground in a variety of arid, open habitats with little woody vegetation. It is common in savannahs, open plains and rocky areas beside dry rivers in biomes such as the Fynbos and the Karoo, where the mean yearly rainfall is below 600 mm (24 in). The average precipitation reduces to 100 to 400 mm (3.9 to 15.7 in) towards the northwestern areas of the range. It prefers areas with short grasses and shrubs common in velds, such as camelthorn in Namibia and Acacia in the Kalahari. It is absent from true deserts, montane regions, and forests. Population densities vary greatly between places, and are significantly influenced by predators and rainfall. For instance, a study in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, where predation pressure is high, recorded a lower mean meerkat density relative to a ranch with lower occurrence of predators; in response to a 10% decrease in rainfall over a year, the density fell from 0.95 to 0.32/km2 (2.46 to 0.83/sq mi).

The meerkat is a social mammal, forming packs of two to 30 individuals each comprising nearly equal numbers of either sex and multiple family units of pairs and their offspring. Members of a pack take turns at jobs such as looking after pups and keeping a lookout for predators. Meerkats are a cooperatively breeding species—typically the dominant 'breeders' in a pack produce offspring. The nonbreeding, subordinate 'helpers' provide altruistic care for the pups. This division of labour is not as strictly defined as it is in specialised eusocial species, such as the breeder-worker distinction in ants. Moreover, meerkats have a clear dominance hierarchy with older individuals having a higher social status. A study showed that dominant individuals can contribute more to offspring care when fewer helpers were available; subordinate members increased their contributions if they could forage better. Packs live in rock crevices in stony areas and in large burrow systems in plains. A pack generally occupies a home range, 5 km2 (1.9 sq mi) large on average but sometimes as big as 15 km2 (5.8 sq mi), containing many burrows 50 to 100 m (160 to 330 ft) apart, of which some remain unused. A 2019 study showed that large burrows towards the centre of a range are preferred over smaller ones located near the periphery; this was especially the case with packs that had pups to raise. …

The word meerkat derives from the Afrikaans language. The origin of the name is uncertain, giving rise to a number of theories, including:

The provincial Dutch / colloquial Afrikaans word mier meaning 'ant' and kat, which means 'cat', hence an 'ant cat' referring to the meerkat's preying on ants and termites. A Dutch name for a kind of monkey, proposed to come from the Old High German mericazza and to be related to the similar Hindi term मर्कट (markat, 'monkey'), deriving from Sanskrit. The Germanic origin of the word, though, long predates any known connections to India. The name was used for small mammals in South Africa from 1801 onward, possibly because the Dutch colonialists used the name in reference to many burrowing animals. In Afrikaans, the meerkat is called graatjiemeerkat or stokstertmeerkat; the term mierkatte or meerkatte can refer to both the meerkat and the yellow mongoose (rooimeerkat).