CONICET | Buscador de Institutos y Recursos Humanos

Despite the fact that armadillos are among the most characteristic mammals of the Neotropical Area, very little work has been performed on their natural history, ontogeny, morphometry, and ecology. Thirty individuals of Zaedyus pichiy, a small armadillo endemic to central and southern Argentina and Chile, were provided by the Dirección de Recursos Naturales Renovables of Mendoza Province to studies ontogenetic and allometric relationships. General morphometric measures, as well as cranial, mandible, limbs, and pelvic osteologic measures, were taken. Age groups were defined based on the degree of sutural synostosis. To compare differences among age groups and genders, eighteen pelvis measures were recorded, obtaining significative differences only for a few of the osteologic measurement. Relationships between total body length and cranial or pelvic length are unclear. Several features, such as sacral length, suggest important ontogenetic postnatal plasticity in the morphology of species, and probably among different populations along its range of distribution. The present study constitutes an advance on postnatal ontogenetic changes and morphometric variations on Z. pichiy skeletons.