Facts

- The short-beaked echidna is Australia's most widely distributed native mammal (Rismiller and Mckelvey 2003).

- Echidnas have a low operative body temperature (31-33 degrees C) that may vary 10 degrees C in 1 day. (Rismiller and Mckelvey 2003).

- Echidnas are egg-laying mammals (Nicol et al 2011).

- Echidnas are the only ant eating specialists in Australia (Nicol et al 2011). Find out more about their eating habits on the Interactions page.

- The monotremes (platypuses and echidnas) represent one of only four extant venomous mammalian lineages. This venom was lost in echindas with a recent ancestor. (Whittington and Belov 2014).

 

 

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