The Prehensile tail reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Prehensile tail

A prehensile tail is a tail that can be used as a "fifth hand". Prehensile tails can be used to hold and manipulate objects. Most of the primates with tails have prehensile tails. Other animals with prehensile tails include the prehensile-tailed porcupine and the prehensile-tailed skink.

The term prehensile is sometimes incorrectly used when "agile" is meant; but the term means "able to grasp" (from the Latin prehendere, the root of "comprehend" and "apprehend").

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