Endangered Species: Guanaco

The guanaco is part of the camel family. Most of its body is covered by soft, long hair. Its legs and head are not. The guanaco is a reddish-brown color with almost white undersides. They weigh about 330 pounds, are about 3.7 feet tall and 5 feet long with a 10 inch tail.

They live in grasslands and scrublands in Argentina, the Andes in Peru, and parts of Chile. There are also a few located in a small isolated region in the Chaco region of Bolivia and Paraguay.

Guanaco are social creatures and live in family groups. These groups can vary from 2 individuals to 30. These groups most often consist of a dominant pair of guanaco and their offspring although sometimes there may be other young females presents as well. The dominant male defends the group from other male guanaco. There are also males groups that consist of up to 50 young and adult males. Males who are sexually and physically mature looking for a mate to start their own family group live alone. Males other than the dominant male and the male offspring of the dominant pair are not allowed in family groups.

Guanaco eat grass, shrubs, plants lichens and fungi. Solitary males and males groups have to travel farther in search of food than the family groups do.

Guanaco females reach sexual maturity at only one year old, however the males do not become fully mature until they are 3 or 4 years old. A guanaco pregnancy lasts about 320-340 days. The guanaco give birth to a single young. After a guanaco gives birth it usually becomes pregnant again a mere week later. Young guanacos nurse until 6 or 8 months old but being supplementing the milk with grazing at a mere 1 month old.

People who live in the areas where the guanaco are present benefit from them by hunting them. They eat their meat, use their hides for clothing and shelter, they use their bezoar stones (indigestible balls of hair and such found in the stomach) for medicine and their fibers for sewing. They also domesticate the young for use in entertainment.