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The phylogenetic significance of Fossa fossana, the Malagasy civet

Monday, August 10, 2026 4:17

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According to Wikipedia Malagasy civet
“The Malagasy civet is a small mammal, about 47 centimetres (19 in) long excluding the tail (which is only about 20 centimetres (7.9 in)). It is endemic to the tropical forests of Madagascar. Malagasy civets are nocturnal. They eat small vertebrates, insects, aquatic animals, and eggs stolen from birds’ nests. The gestation period is three months, ending with the birth of one young.”

This taxon had the bad luck of having a generic name which is also the common name for the genus Cryptoprocata ferox – the fossa.

Also note the wide-spectrum diet, perfect for a taxon basal to placental 1 taxa that ultimately focused to produce strict meat eaters and strict plant-eaters.

That such an ancient placental is still alive
testifies to its isolated geographic location: the African island of Madagascar, where so many other ancient placentals (tenrecs, lemurs, the aye-aye) continue to live in 2026 after disappearing elsewhere on the planet.

Here
in the large reptile tree (LERT, 2340 taxa) Fossa nests near the base of the placental 1 taxa, basal to the coatimundi, Nasua (Fig 3), basal to the pre-carnivoramorpha, Potos (Fig 4), and basal to the pre-primate, Paroodectes.

Fossa is derived from
the small (3 taxon) clade that includes Tetraclaenodonn, Harpagolestes macrocephalus and (wait for it)… giant Andrewsarchus.

That’s for now. Things can always change. It’s a hypothesis.

Figure 3. At left the skull of Nasua, the coatimundi from Central America. At right the skull of Fossa, the Malagasy civet, from the other side of the planet. These taxa probably roamed Gondwana prior to the appearance of the Atlantic Ocean.

So, via phylogenetic inference
we finally have a good idea what the post-crania of Andrewsarchus and Tetraclaenodon looked like in a cousin-sort of guesstimate.

We also know a living taxon that preceded pre-primates, Potos, the kinkajou (Fig 4) and we can see that it began to develop a short face, convergent with monkeys. The prehensile tail is shared with lemurs, also by convergence at the present level of understanding.

Figure 4 The kinkajou, Potos, as a museum mount.

The pouchless marsupial, Monodelphis domestica,
is in the lineage of all these taxa. So is Sarcophilus, the Tasmanian Devil, and Thylacinus, the Tasmanian wolf, aka Tasmanian tiger. … And more than a dozen creodonts in a clade between these pouched marsupial and the placental 1 clade.

Are creodonts marsupials? or placentals? The LRT cannot tell us that yet.

References
Gray JE 1864. A revision of the genera and species of viverrine animals (Viverridae) founded on the collection in the British Museum. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London 1864: 502–579.
Müller PLS 1776. Des Ritters Carl von Linné Königlich Schwedischen Leibarztes &c. &c. vollständigen Natursystems Supplements- und Register-Band über alle sechs Theile oder Classen des Thierreichs. Mit einer ausführlichen Erklärung. Nebst drey Kupfertafeln.Nürnberg. (Raspe).

wiki/Malagasy civet – Fossa

Source: https://pterosaurheresies.wordpress.com/2026/08/10/the-phylogenetic-significance-of-fossa-fossana-the-malagasy-civet/

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