thumb|swimming, Cristalino River, Mato Grosso
The South American tapir (Tapirus terrestris), also commonly called the Brazilian tapir (from the Tupi ), the Amazonian tapir, the maned tapir, the lowland tapir, (Brazilian Portuguese), and la sachavaca (literally "bushcow", in mixed Quechua and Spanish), is one of the four recognized species in the tapir family (of the order Perissodactyla, with the mountain tapir, the Malayan tapir, and the Baird's tapir). It is the largest surviving native terrestrial mammal in the Amazon.
Most classifications also include Tapirus kabomani (also known as the dwarf black tapir or the kabomani tapir) as also belonging to the species Tapirus terrestris (Brazilian tapir), despite its questionable existence and the overall lack of information on its habits and distribution. The specific epithet derives from arabo kabomani, the word for tapir in the local Paumarí language. The formal description of this tapir did not suggest a common name for the species. In 2024, the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) has officially ruled that the binomen Tapirus pygmaeus has priority over Tapirus kabomani given that they are synonyms after a 2014 petition.
Appearance
T. terrestris is dark brown, paler in the face, and has a low, erect crest running from the crown down the back of the neck. The round, dark ears have distinctive white edges. Newborn tapirs have a dark brown coat, with small white spots and stripes along the body. The South American tapir can attain a body length of with a short stubby tail and an average weight around . Adult weight has been reported ranging from . It stands somewhere between at the shoulder.
thumb|South American tapir skull, on display at the [[Museum of Osteology, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma]]
Features claimed for Tapirus kabomani
With an estimated mass of only , T. kabomani is the smallest living tapir. Tapirus kabomani is roughly long and in shoulder height. On rare occasions, waifs have crossed the narrow sea channel from Venezuela to the southern coast of the island of Trinidad (but no breeding population exists there).
Tapirus kabomani is restricted to South America. It is found in habitats consisting of a mosaic of forest and savannah. and in southern French Guiana.
Behavior
thumb|Running, in [[Pantanal, Mato Grosso, Brazil.]]
T. terrestris is an excellent swimmer and diver, but also moves quickly on land, even over rugged, mountainous terrain. It has a life span of approximately 25 to 30 years. In the wild, its main predators are crocodilians (only the black caiman and Orinoco crocodile, the latter of which is critically endangered, are large enough to take these tapirs, as the American crocodile only exists in the northern part of South America) and large cats, such as the jaguar and cougar, which often attack tapirs at night when tapirs leave the water and sleep on the riverbank. The South American tapir is also attacked by the green anaconda (Eunectes murinus).
Although they may flee into the bush or into water when threatened, lowland tapirs are capable of defending themselves with their very powerful bite; in 2005, a 55 year old farmer stabbed a 400 lb female lowland tapir that was feeding in his cornfield, which responded by repeatedly biting the man. Both died from their wounds.
There is a need for more research to better explore social interactions.
Diet
thumbnail|Browsing leaves at Pouso Alegre, Transpantaneira, Poconé, Mato Grosso, Brazil
The South American tapir is an herbivore. Using its mobile nose, it feeds on leaves, buds, shoots, and small branches it tears from trees, fruit, grasses, and aquatic plants. They also feed on the vast majority of seeds found in the rainforest. This is known because the diet is studied through observation of browsing, analysis of feces, and studying stomach contents. Analysis of δ<sup>13</sup>C values of fossils of the South American tapir from Lapa do Bode cave in Ituaçu Municipality of the State of Bahia shows that their diet was predominantly composed of C<sub>3</sub> plants.
Although it has been determined via fecal samples that T. kabomani feeds on palm tree leaves and seeds from the genera Attalea and Astrocaryum, much about the diet and ecology of T. kabomani is unknown. Previously discovered tapirs are known to be important seed dispersers and to play key roles in the rainforest or mountain ecosystems in which they occur. It has a significantly lower risk of extinction, though, than the other four tapir species.
Conservation of T. kabomani
The species may be relatively common in forest-savanna mosaic habitat (relicts of former cerrado). Nevertheless, the species is threatened by prospects of future habitat loss related to deforestation, development and expanding human populations.
Humans aside, the region of the Amazon in which T. kabomani is found has also been highlighted as an area that is likely to be particularly susceptible to global warming and the ecosystem changes it brings. as local hunters recognized two types of tapir in the region Nevertheless, though observed by experts, all tapirs from the expedition have been consistently treated as T. terrestris, including specimen AMNH 36661, which is now identified as T. kabomani. When the species was formally described in December 2013,
Relationships
In both morphological and molecular phylogenetic analyses, Morphologically, lack of published numerical ranges for diagnostic differences make it incredibly difficult for individuals to be identified in the field as little black tapirs instead of South American tapirs. A heavy reliance upon the indigenous people for identification of T. kabomani was also noted in the major dissenting article. Concerns were cited regarding the reliability of information when it is gathered from locals as, while they are frequently aware of many more species in an area, they can sometimes describe haplotypes of culturally important species to be entirely different species. Several other objections raised against the distinction of T. kabomani from T. terrestris, including external and internal morphological characters, statistical analysis, distribution and use of folk taxonomy, were addressed in Cozzuol et al (2014). Dumbá et al. reevaluated skull shape variation among tapir species and found that T. kabomani and T. terrestris exhibit considerable overlap in skull morphology, though it could still be distinguished by its broad forehead.