John Carlos Baez @johncarlosbaez@mathstodon.xyz
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Wow - two new mammal species have just been discovered! Even better, one is of an entirely new genus.

One is a striped possum with an extraordinarily long fourth finger - twice as long as the rest - that it uses to get wood-boring insect larvae to eat. It was known to have lived in West Papua until about 6,000 years ago... but it's actually still there!

The other is a ring-tailed glider: a marsupial that can soar downwards through the air. Fossils from this genus have been found in eastern Australia and New Guinea, but those are hundreds of thousands of years old!

Both these new species were found on Bird's Head Peninsula on West Papua. And both were found by the same team, who must be feeling ecstatic right now. Of course they're not really "new": they were just flying under the radar.

theguardian.com/environment/20

A map of West Papua, which is north of Australia, and peninsula on its far west, called Bird's Head Peninsula. This graphic is from The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/mar/05/marsupials-discovered-new-guinea
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