GUANACO{Auchenia guanaσus), one of the four species of ruminant animals which represent in South America the camels of the East, and which resemble them in the possession of canine teeth in both lower and upper jaws. The Guanaco is the largest species, standing nearly 4 feet high at the shoulders. It is an elegant creature, with gracefully curved neck and long slender legs; its body is covered with long soft hair of a fawn colour above and almost pure whito beneath. It 13 found throughout the southern half of South America, from Peru in the north to Cape Horn in the south, but occurs in greatest abundance in Patagonia. It lives in herds usually of from six to thirty, although these occasionally contain several hundreds, while solitary individuals are sometimes met with. They are exceedingly timid, and therefore wary and difficult of approach; like many other ruminants, however, their curiosity sometimes overcomes their timidity, so as to bring them within range of the hunter’s rifle. Their cry is peculiar, being described by Cunningham {Natural History of the Strait of Magellan, 1871) as something between the belling of a deer and the neigh of a horse. The chief enemies of the guanaco, according to the same authority, are the Patagonian Indiane and the puma, as it forms the principal food of both. Its flesh is palatable although wanting in fat, while its skin forms the chief clothing material of the gigantic Patagonians. According to Darwin, who studied it in its native wilds, the guanaco is readily domesticated, and in this state becomes very bold and will attack man, striking him from behind with both knees. In the wild state, however, they never seek to defend themselves, and if approached from different points, according to the Indian fashion of hunting them, ...they get completely bewildered and fall an easy prey. They take readily to the water, and have been observed swimming from one island to another, while Byron in his Narrative states that he has seen them drinking salt-water. They have a singular habit of dropping their dung during successive days on the same spot—a habit which is greatly appreciated by the Peruvian Indians, who use those deposits for fuel. They seem also to have favourite localities in which to die, as appears from the great heaps of bones bearing no sign of having been gnawed by the puma, which have been found in particular spots.
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