White-nosed Coati (Nasua narica) Fact Sheet: Taxonomy & History

Taxonomy

• White-nosed coati currently recognized as 1 species and 4 subspecies (Kays 2009a)
• Other species of coati:
• Ring-tailed (South American) coati (Nasua nasua) (Hirsch and Gompper 2017)
• Mountain coatis (Nasuella spp.) (Hirsch and Gompper 2017)

Nomenclature

• Genus Nasua
• From the Latin word for “nose” (Kays 2009a)

Synonyms

• Viverra narica (Kays 2009b; Cuarón et al. 2015)
• Viverra nasua (Gompper 1995)
• Nasua nelsoni (Gompper 1995)
• Nasua thersites (Gompper 1995)
• Nasua subfusca (Gompper 1995)

Common names

• “Coati”
• Originates from Tupian languages of South America (Gompper 1995)
• Refers to coati’s sleeping posture: nose tucked into belly
• “Coati-mundi” refers specifically to solitary male coatis (Kaufmann 1983)
• Early researchers confused by coati social structure (Kaufmann 1962; Gompper 1995)
• Defined species names based on behavioral (rather than morphological) differences
• “Solitary” = Nasua solitaria (referred to solitary adult males)
• “Sociable” = N. sociabilis (referred to groups comprised of females and juveniles)
• Similar incorrect names persist in North and South America today
• Names by language
• White-nosed coati, coatimundi (English) (Cuarón et al. 2015)
• Coati à nez blanc (French) (Kays 2009b)
• Weißrüssel-Nasenbär (German)
• Coati pizote or pisote, cozumbo, tejón, choluga (Leopold 1959; Cuarón et al. 2015); coati (López-del-Toro et al. 2009) (Spanish)

Fossil history and evolutionary relationships

• Coatis closely related to olingos, raccoons, and ringtails (Koepfli et al. 2007)
• Coatis and olingos diverged approximately 12 mya (Koepfli et al. 2007)
• Most recent coati common ancestor from South or Central America (Nigenda-Morales et al. 2019)
• Genetic evidence suggests coatis migrated from South America to North America
• Not north to south, as suggested by fossil record
• Nasua species diversified in South America (Nigenda-Morales et al. 2019)
• Nasua narica and N. nasua diverged approximately 7 to 8 mya (Koepfli et al. 2007)

Closest living relatives

(Koepfli et al. 2007; Helgen et al. 2009; Koepfli et al. 2017)

• Eastern mountain coati, Nasuella meridensis
• Western mountain coati, Nasuella olivacea
• South American (ring-tailed) coati, Nasua nasua

Culture and folklore

• Hunting and culture
  • Coatis important food animals for early subsistence hunters in Mexico (e.g., Hamblin 1984; Redford and Robinson 1991)
    • Hunting rituals performed to appease supernatural animal guardians and bring about species regeneration
  • Similar beliefs in greater Mesoamerica area (Redford and Robinson 1991)
  • Coati bones found at Mayan hunting shrines in Guatemalan Highlands (Brown 2005)
• Traditional Medicine
  • Mexico
    • Market for skins (Aranda 1991)
    • Coati fat used to treat skin infections, pimples, muscle aches, and epilepsy (Avila-Najera et al. 2011)
  • Latin America
    • Coati penis used to treat male impotence (see Alves and Alves 2011, p. 31) (Almeida et al. 2005, as cited by Alves and Alves 2011)
  • South American (ring-tailed) coati used for many purposes (see references in Alves and Alves 2011, p. 30)

Books

• Children’s books
  • White-nosed Coati: Raccoon’s Cousin by Joyce L. Markovics (2012)

Poetry

• John Updike references the white-nosed coati in “Pura Vida” (2000)

Television and film

• Documentaries
  • “Land of the Coati-Mundi” — Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom
    • Features white-nosed coatis living in Arizona
    • Footage of foraging, climbing, behavior of young, and interactions with other desert animals

Art

• Early paintings
  • White-nosed coati illustration by Alfred Edmund Brehm (1900)
  • The Coati from Animate Creation (1885)
  • White-nosed Coati from The Royal Natural History (1894)
• Sculpture
  • Coati sculpture, Mexico (600–900 A.D.)

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Mammalia

Order: Carnivora

Family: Procyonidae (Gray, 1825) — coatis, olingos, raccoons, kinkajou, ringtails

Genus: Nasua (Storr, 1780) — coatis

Species: Nasua narica (Linnaeus, 1766) — white-nosed coati

Subspecies: Nasua narica narica (Linnaeus, 1766) — southern Mexico, Central America, and north and west Colombia
Subspecies: Nasua narica molaris (Merriam, 1902) — Mexico and southwest U.S.
Subspecies: Nasua narica nelsoni (Merriam, 1901) (a.k.a. “dwarf coati”) — Mexico (Cozumel Island)
Subspecies: Nasua narica yucatanica (J. A. Allen, 1904) — Mexico (Yucatán Peninsula)

Sources: Kays (2009a), Koepfli et al. (2017), ITIS (2019)

Illustration of coatis from Animate Creation (1885).

The two coatis in the background exhibit agonistic behavior; the coati in foreground sniffs along a branch.

Image credit: Wood JG. 1885. Animate Creation: a Popular Edition of "Our Living World," a Natural History. Vol. 1. New York (NY): Selmar Hess; p. 332. Made available by Biodiversity Heritage Library. Public domain.