Anteaters are so named because they eat white termites. Few people realize that anteaters have no teeth. Their Jawbones protrude and are almost entirely covered with skin, making their oral cavities very small. An anteater's tongue, covered with adhesive saliva to hold termites on touch, can be extended a long way beyond its mouth. Then the animal draws its back and swallows. Although some termites build sizable mud nests, the anteater's powerful front paws have lengthy claws that can tear open the termites' nests, either on the ground or in trees.
The claws on anteaters' front legs are so long that the animals walk on the outer edges of their feet rather than on the soles. The longest claw folds back into a skin pouch in the sole of the foot. The solitary Tamadua anteater utilizes its prehensile tail as an arm to grasp a tree branch and lift itself as high as the tree crown. This physical characteristic enables the Tamadua anteaters to live and hunt in trees. The silky anteater can also live in trees and sleeps curled up on a branch, to which it anchors itself by its tail and hind feet. Although the animals rarely attack, when disturbed they rear up on their hind legs and draw their forefeet alongside their head to strike an enemy with their claws or to squeeze it in their forearms. With only one offspring at a time, these mamals are extremely protective of their young, which ride on their mother's back. Little is known about anteaters' habitats and social organization