It looks like a cross between a Teddy Bear and a Cat, and western scientists say they’ve just discovered it, although it’s probably been around for many, many centuries.  We’re talking about the Olinguito.

Scientists in the US have discovered the Olinguito living in the cloud forests of Colombia and Ecuador, likely known to indigenous people, but newly discovered by the outside world.  The Olinguito is the first newly-identified carnivore in the Western hemisphere in 35 years.

The story goes like this:  American zoologist Kristofer Helgen from the Smithsonian Institution was rummaging through some old animal bones and skins at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, and realized some had been mislabeled. 

After using DNA to determine that they really didn’t know what it was, researchers set out on an expedition to find it, and find it they did;  The Olinguito is now known to inhabit a number of protected areas from Central Colombia to Western Ecuador.  Although it is a carnivore, it eats mainly fruit, comes out at night and lives by itself.