If the Brazilian tapir’s eye-catching ensemble of creature features brings to mind ancient beasts, that’s because the shy, primarily nocturnal South American megafauna is one of the oldest species of large mammal remaining on Earth. The origins of this floppy-nosed, bristly-maned, odd-toed ungulate date back approximately 35 million years. For the ungulate-uninitiated, tapirs are Perissodactyls, hooved herbivores who like their closest relatives horses and rhinoceros, possess an odd number of toes. The Brazilian, or lowland, tapir is one of four widely recognized species of tapir native to the forests, grasslands, and mountains of Central and South America and Southeast Asia.

Measuring five to eight feet long and weighing between 300 and 700 pounds, the Brazilian tapir maintains its impressive bulk by consuming up to an equally impressive 85 pounds worth of shoots, leaves, branches, and fruit a day. As it turns out, the tapir’s hearty appetite for seed-bearing plants plays an important role in restoring degraded rainforests. According to researchers at Ohio State University, 80 percent of trees in the Amazon are dependent upon animals for seed dispersal. One of the primary “gardeners of the rainforest” tapirs ingest and expel a large variety of seeds that have future tree potential. Results of a recent study carried out by scientists at the Amazon Environmental Research Institute in Mato Grosso, Brazil, found that 99 percent of 130,000 seeds passed through a tapir’s digestive systems intact. Seeds that survive the digestive process are more likely to germinate. And here’s where it gets more ‘oh, wow’ interesting: the Mato Grosso study suggests that tapirs may prefer to browse and graze in degraded plots of land rather than in unspoiled forest. When sunlight hits the earth as a result of tree canopy loss in burnt or degraded areas, it forces up and reveals tender green shoots from the forest floor that are attractive to tapirs. The tapirs observed in the study spent about twice as much time feeding in degraded plots resulting in more seed “deposits” in areas in need of reforestation.

In the Amazon, wildlife depend upon healthy forest systems, and as the Ohio State and Mato Grosso research indicates, healthy forest systems depend upon wildlife. The Brazilian tapir’s natural capacity to contribute to tree planting can be an important factor in helping to regenerate carbon-storing, rainforest habitat. That is why protecting an umbrella species like the tapir also serves to protect other animals in its ecosystem.

Despite their aptitude for seed dispersal, Brazilian tapirs alone can’t compensate for elevated rates of Amazon deforestation. In addition, as a result of rapid habitat loss due to wildfires and ongoing land-use change, as well as illegal hunting, populations of Brazilian tapirs are decreasing and currently listed as vulnerable by the IUCN. The good news is you can help keep the hooved horticulturalists of Central and South America in their gardening groove by supporting the tapir research of Nai Conservation and the conservation action plans of the Tapir Specialist Group.