Fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox) Fact Sheet: Diet & Feeding

Carnivores

• Commonly consume vertebrates (from Hawkins and Racey 2008 unless otherwise noted)
  • Lemurs, tenrec, rodents, snakes, birds, lizards, and amphibians
  • Lemurs often compose >50% of prey items
    • Red-tailed sportive, fork-marked and Coquerel’s dwarf lemurs are their preferred prey in the Kirindy Forest
• Other food items(from Hawkins and Racey 2008 unless otherwise noted)
  • Insects
    • Uncommonly eaten
  • Crabs (Goodman et al. 1997)
  • Livestock/domestic chickens
• Seeds occasionally present in scat
  • Likely not targeted for consumption, but ingested as part of stomach contents of lemur prey

Diet seasonally variable (from Hawkins and Racey 2008)

• Wet season
  • Tenrec are taken more often
  • Reliance on lemurs is somewhat diminished, comparatively
• Dry season
  • Increase consumption of domestic chickens

Feeding & Drinking

• Feeding
• Consume internal organs as well as meat (from Wright et al. 1997)
• Heart, lungs, and liver
• Drinking
• Lap water from small pools

Fossa consuming a bird.

Image credit: Mathias Appel, via Flickr. Public domain.