Owston's Banded Palm Civets (Chrotogale owstoni): Ringtails of China, Laos, and Vietnam

Civets are native to Africa and Asia. Their strong-smelling, yellow-colored musk endears them to perfume-lovers worldwide. Their English, French (civette), and Italian (zibetto) names indeed find their oldest known origins in the Arabic trader word زباد (zábād, “foam, froth, spume”) preserved by Abu al-Hasan Ali ibn al-Husayn ibn Ali al-Mas’udi (896? – September 956?), as:

• Direct descendant of Abdullah ibn Masud (died 652?), early disciple of the Islamic prophet Muhammad (570? – June 6, 632);
• Islamic geo-historian;
• Muruj adh-dhahab wa ma’adin al-jawahir ("The Meadows of Gold and Mines of Gems") world history writer.

Non-European names may emphasize other attributes. For example, the Vietnamese designation cầy vằn bắc for Owston’s banded palm civets recognizes:

• Corporeal stripes;
• Dog/fox-like looks;
• Northern bio-geography.

Formal presentation of Owston’s banded palm civets to scientists outside Africa dates to 1912. It describes a young male specimen from Yên Bái, on the Gulf of Tonkin-exiting Sông Cái. It showcases the excellent abilities and extraordinary intelligence of Michael Rogers Oldfield Thomas (February 21, 1858 – June 16, 1929), as:

• Pupil at Haileybury College, site of the United Kingdom’s largest academic quadrangle and successor to the East India College for Honourable East India Company administrators;
• Specimen collector at Table Mountain, Cape Colony Archdiocese;
• Specimen collector throughout western Europe and South America with his beloved wife Mary Kane Clark;
• Taxonomist of 2,000+ species and subspecies;
• Writer of 1,000+ books, catalogues, and documents;
• Zoologist at London’s Natural History Museum.

Common, trivial, or vernacular names generally accede to popular customs and traditional use. Binomial (“two-name”), Latin, scientific, or taxonomic names typically acknowledge scientific consensus. The two nomenclatures can differ or overlap. For Owston’s civets (Chrotogale owstoni), they diverge in language and through omission. The common and the species names honor Alan Owston (August 7, 1853 – November 30, 1915), as:

• Pirbright, Surrey-born amateur naturalist;
• Yokohama, Japan-based merchant, specimen collector, and yachtsman;
• Yunnan, China-oriented expeditions sponsor.

The holotype (species standard) specimen indeed is among the National History Museum holdings because of Owston expedition collector Orii’s retrieving the sample on September 16, 1911. But its taxonomic classification omits the facts that Owston’s civets have semi-striped tails and prefer palm trees.

China, Laos, and Vietnam are the homelands of Owston’s banded palm civets. The distributional range concentrates most on central and northern Vietnam’s:

• Fansipan Mountains;
• Hoàng Liên Sơn Mountain Range;
• Limestone highlands;
• Pù Mát National Park in the northern Annamite Range;
• Quảng Nam Province in the central Annamites;
• Sông Đà (Black River).

No populations apparently extend west of the Mekong River even though two specimens grace Cambodia’s Phnom Tamao Zoological Park and Wildlife Rescue Center taxidermy collection. But the distributional ranges fork from their Vietnamese center. They go northward into southern China’s Guangxi and Yunnan Provinces. They head northwestward into the Laotian border provinces of:

• Attapeu;
• Bolikkhamsai;
• Hua Phan;
• Khammouane;
• Luang Prabang;
• Phongsali;
• Salvan, Savannakhet, Sekong;
• Xieng Khouang.

Specific habitats within southeast Asia appeal to Owston’s banded palm civets. The obligate watchwords are water, woods, and worms. The life cycles and natural histories of Owston’s banded palm civets indeed demand access to humidity and moisture through proximity to:

• Lakes;
• Lowland river basins;
• Streams.

They depend upon the natural, simple dens which offer themselves:

• Amidst thick brush and vines;
• Within ground burrows, rocky crevices, and tree hollows.

Owston’s banded palm genets therefore flourish in:

• Bamboo forests;
• Broadleaf forests over limestone geology;
• Evergreen montane forests;
• Wooded lowlands.

But at the same time, they make allowances for agro-industrial expansion and population growth by tolerating:

• Forest edges;
• Heavily degraded forests.

Water-blessed woods are worm-filled homelands. Worms claim more than 50% of the nightly diet of Owston’s banded palm civets. Forages from dusk to early morning cover:

• Ground-level surfaces for earthworms;
• Trees for seasonal fruits and small invertebrates.  

Owston’s banded palm civets do not pursue vertebrates even though in captivity and domestication they readily accept:

• Bananas;
• Beef;
• Chicken.

Their dentition in fact falls more in line with insectivorousness (“insect-eating”) than with carnivorousness (“meat-eating”). It involves broad, close-set incisors whose semi-circular arrangement is rare among carnivores and reminiscent of kangaroos. It joins with cranial features, extensive spotting, and neck-hair growth to distinguish Owston’s banded palm civets from otherwise super-similar banded palm civets (Hemigalus derbyanus).

Owston's banded palm civets begin life in litters:

• Bred yearly, November/January to March;

• Delivered after 2 – 2-1/2 months;

• Yielding 1+ offspring, each weighing 0.17 – 0.19 ounces (75 – 88 grams).

Physical and sexual maturity confers:

• Black-and-white longitudinal forehead lines;

• 4 shoulders-to-rump and 2 tail-base transverse bands;

• Head-and-body lengths of 22.05 – 28.35 inches (560 – 720 millimeters);

• Orange-buff under-sides;

• Spotted flanks, limbs, and neck;

• Tail lengths of 14.96 – 18.5 inches (350 – 470 millimeters);

• Tawny-grey upper-sides;

• Weights of 5.51 – 8.82 pounds (2.5 – 4 kilograms).

Five-year life expectancies increase with:

• Government protected homelands (10 in Vietnam, 3 in China, 2 in Laos);

• Scientific research.   

Survival is a daily battle for Owston's banded palm civets (Chrotogale owstoni), despite homelands in protected areas, such as in northern and central Vietnam.

Habitat degradation and loss constitute the greatest threats to continuity as a species for Owston's banded palm civets.

Mining poses serious threats as rare earth elements are found in Vietnam. The encroachment of mining enterprises upon hithertofore undeveloped landscapes raises the standard concerns of development vs. biodiversity.

Equally menacing to the vulnerable Owston's civet's survival is intensive snare-hunting throughout their range. As ground-dwellers, Owston's banded palm civets run exhaustingly dangerous gauntlets, peppered with snares, in their daily foragings.

Hunters cater to an insatiable market for bushmeat, living trophies, pelts, and traditional medicine.

While reclusiveness generally serves as a strength for the world's fauna, Owston's banded palm civets are faced with devising strategies beyond seclusion, for their habitats are booby-trapped with snares.

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Owston's palm civet
Rare Species Conservation Centre, Sandwich, Kent, South-East England: Marie Hale, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/15016964@N02/4911084035/

Banded palm civet (Hemigalus derbyanus)
Cncinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden; Avondale neighborhood, Cincinnati, Hamilton County, southwestern Ohio: Greg Hume (Greg5030), CC BY SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Banded_palm_civet_10.jpg

oil on canvas by John Ernest Breun (1862-1921): Kristofer M. Helgen, Roberto Portela Miguez, James Kohen, Lauren Helgen/ZooKeys, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Portrait_of_Michael_Rogers_Oldfield_Thomas_-_ZooKeys-255-103-g003-bottom_right.jpeg; via Pensoft Publishers / ZooKeys @ https://zookeys.pensoft.net/showimg.php?filename=oo_25946.jpg

Distribution data from IUCN Red List: Chermundy/ IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, species assessors and the authors of the spatial data, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Owston's_Palm_Civet_area.png

Nghệ An Province, in Vietnam's North Central Coast region: Rolf Müller (Rolfmueller), CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Annamite_range_pu_mat_2007_05.jpg

view from from Hang Tôm bridge near Mường Lay town, Điện Biên province, northwestern Vietnam: [Tycho], http://shansov.net, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sông_Đà.jpg

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erbium, a lanthanoid: Wilco Oelen, CC BY SA 3.0, via Science Made Alive (http://woelen.homescience.net/) @ http://woelen.homescience.net/science/chem/elem/elements/Ln/index.html; W. Oelen, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Erbium3.jpg

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Owston's civet (Chrotogale owstoni)
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