The Pyrenean Chamois Rupicapra pyrenaica, is a goat antelope

Goat antelope

A goat-antelope or caprid is any of the species of mostly medium-sized bovids that make up the subfamily Caprinae , part of the Bovidae family of ruminants...

 that lives in the Pyrenees

Pyrenees

The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...

, Cantabrian Mountains

Cantabrian Mountains

The Cantabrian Mountains or Cantabrian Range are one of the main systems of mountain ranges in Spain.They extend for more than approximately 180 miles across northern Spain, from the western limit of the Pyrenees to the edges of the Galician Massif close to Galicia, along the coast of the...

 and Apennine Mountains

Apennine mountains

The Apennines or Apennine Mountains or Greek oros but just as often used alone as a noun. The ancient Greeks and Romans typically but not always used "mountain" in the singular to mean one or a range; thus, "the Apennine mountain" refers to the entire chain and is translated "the Apennine...

. It is one of the two species of the genus Rupicapra, the other being the Chamois

Chamois

The chamois, Rupicapra rupicapra, is a goat-antelope species native to mountains in Europe, including the Carpathian Mountains of Romania, the European Alps, the Tatra Mountains, the Balkans, parts of Turkey, and the Caucasus. The chamois has also been introduced to the South Island of New Zealand...

, Rupicapra rupicapra. It is in the Caprinae subfamily of bovid

Bovid

A bovid is any of almost 140 species of cloven-hoofed ruminant mammal at least the males of which bear characteristic unbranching horns covered in a permanent sheath of keratin....

s, along with sheep and goat

Goat

The domestic goat is a subspecies of goat domesticated from the wild goat of southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the Bovidae family and is closely related to the sheep as both are in the goat-antelope subfamily Caprinae. There are over three hundred distinct breeds of...

s.

Up to 80 cm tall, its summer coat is a ruddy brown; in winter it is black/brown with darker patches around the eyes. Both males and females have backward-hooked horn

Horn (anatomy)

A horn is a pointed projection of the skin on the head of various animals, consisting of a covering of horn surrounding a core of living bone. True horns are found mainly among the ruminant artiodactyls, in the families Antilocapridae and Bovidae...

s up to 20 cm in length. They browse on grass

Grass

Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...

, lichen

Lichen

Lichens are composite organisms consisting of a symbiotic organism composed of a fungus with a photosynthetic partner , usually either a green alga or cyanobacterium...

s and buds of trees. Sure-footed and agile, they are found anywhere up to 3000 m.

Like other species of chamois, it was hunted almost to extinction

Extinction

In biology and ecology, extinction is the end of an organism or of a group of organisms , normally a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and recover may have been lost before this point...

, especially in the 1940s, for the production of chamois leather

Chamois leather

Chamois leather , sometimes known as a shammy, is a type of porous leather that is favored for its gentle, non-abrasive composition and exceptional absorption properties...

. The population has since recovered and in 2002 was estimated to be about 25,000. (Pérez et al., 2002)

Subspecies

• R. p. pyrenaica (Pyrenean chamois)
• R. p. parva (Cantabrian chamois): Spain
• R. p. ornata (Apennine chamois): Central and south Italy