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OverviewAI-generated
Meles is a genus of mammals within the family Mustelidae, order Carnivora, class Mammalia, phylum Chordata, and kingdom Animalia. It belongs to the subfamily Melinae and was described by Brisson in 1762. The genus is taxonomically accepted and includes species commonly referred to as European Badgers, Blaireau européen, Barsukas, and Europäische Dachse.
The temporal range of the genus begins in the Pleistocene. Its distribution spans the Palearctic region of Eurasia, specifically in forest and grassland habitats. Records indicate presence in China, with specimens held by institutions including GNM, AMNH, and CAS. The taxon has 552,971 recorded occurrences and is referenced by 579 other encyclopedia articles.
Synthesized by Vinony from 31 facts across 7 sources: Wikidata, GBIF, Gbif Occ, Encyclopedia of Life, WoRMS, iDigBio, Vinony graph. Generated from structured data (not the Wikipedia text) and checked against those facts — may still contain errors.
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Encyclopedic overview
Meles is a genus of badgers containing four living species known as Eurasian badgers, the Japanese badger (Meles anakuma), Asian badger (Meles leucurus), Caucasian badger (Meles canescens) and European badger (Meles meles). In an older categorization, they were seen as a single species with three subspecies (Meles meles anakuma, Meles meles leucurus and Meles meles meles). There are also several extinct members of the genus. They are members of the subfamily Melinae of the weasel family, Mustelidae.
Taxonomy
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Meles” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.