* There are about 23 different species of porcupine in the world.
* Porcupines are the 3rd largest rodent in the world. (Capybara and Beaver are the 1st and 2nd.)
* Porcupines like salty things.
* They are not afraid of water and will swim across lakes and streams to get where they are going.
* There is a 30 minute time table after a baby porcupine is born. Their quills are soft until this point when they begin to harden.
* Much to popular belief, porcupines don't throw their quills. They do easily come loose though.
* Unlike most mammals, the male also helps the female in taking care of the young.
* Porcupine quills are as sharp as needles, detach very easily, and will remain embedded in an attacker. Unlike needles, however, the quills have microscopic, backwards-facing barbs on the tip that catch on the skin making them difficult and painful to extract. If a quill becomes lodged in the tissues of a would-be attacker, the barbs act to pull the quill further into the tissues with the normal muscle movements of the attacker, moving up to several millimeters in a day. Predators have been known to die as a result of quill penetration and infection. Quills are still capable of penetrating animals and humans even after death.
* The name “porcupine” means “one who rises up in anger!”
* Porcupines grow new quills to replace the ones they lose.
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