Dear Kid,

If you were to meander over to Madagascar, and if you were to venture into the forest, you might meet a fossa.

Fossas live only in the forests of Madagascar, where they choose to chomp on lemurs and other small furry critters which doesn’t make them popular among Zaboomafoo fans.

Fossa live in Madagascar DearKidLoveMom.comFossas look more or less catlike with a dog muzzle. But don’t try cuddling them; they’ll rip your face off. For the record, they are related to the mongoose (I would have said “they are related to mongooses” but then I wasn’t sure if the plural is “mongooses” or “mongeese” or “mongoosi”).

Fossas grows up long to 6 feet from nose to tail tip, which is a silly way to measure them, because they are mostly tail (they only weigh 26 pounds at the max end). They use their long tails to help balance while they scoot through the trees where they spend a great deal of time. They are surprisingly speedy (surprising to their dinner of choice and to scientists who try to study them).

The fossa does not moo. Or mu. Or moue. Or μ.

(Get it? Moo-fossa? Oh, never mind.)

A Moue is a pouting expression usually used to convey annoyance or distaste.

You have seen many a moue whether or not you knew to label them as such.

You may have even made a moue. Certainly when you were little, you knew how to moo.

Deja Moo. The feeling you’ve heard this bull before.

There is no recorded evidence of a fossa making a “moo” sound or a moue face. The scientists who study fossa, however, are a different matter.

Love, Mom