AKA: Meerkat is Dutch for “lake cat,” but meerkats are not felines. They are members of the mongoose family.

Type: Mammal.

Home: African deserts.

Diet: Omnivore. Favorite foods include insects, small mammals and reptiles, scorpions, and tubers and roots. Meerkats have no fat reserves, so they must eat nearly every day.

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Granted immunity: Adult meerkats are resistant to scorpion’s venom, but must still be wary of the scorpion’s large pincers. Adults teach young meerkats what kinds of food to eat. They will even bring home a scorpion with its tail bitten off, so the young can learn how to kill them without getting hurt.

Average life span: Up to 10 years in the wild; 12-14 years in captivity.

Shoulder height: 6 inches.

Body length: 12 inches.

Weight: 2 pounds.

Birth: After a gestation period of 11 weeks, a litter of 2-5 pups is born. The mostly hairless pups are born with their eyes and ears closed. They start eating food other than milk at three weeks and venture out of the den at four weeks. Meerkats, which may produce four litters a year, are sexually mature at one year of age.

Now you know: Meerkats have a matriarchal society and live in underground burrows in large groups of up to 30 called a gang, mob or clan. Each clan has a dominant male and female, who do most of the mating. The alpha female may kill offspring of other females. Subordinate adults will baby-sit the alpha pair’s offspring. Meerkats are very social and animals in the same group regularly groom each other and play together to strengthen social bonds. One or more meerkats take turns on sentry duty, standing upright on their rear legs and watching for predators in approximately one-hour shifts while others forage or play. If a predator is spotted, the sentry barks a warning call and the gang retreats underground. Meerkats have long, curved claws and can dig quickly, but usually live in burrows dug by other animals such as ground squirrels.

Screen stars: Most people know meerkats from the character Timon in the animated film “The Lion King.” They have also been featured in the 2008 documentary “The Meerkats” and on the Animal Planet series “Meerkat Manor.”

Protection status: Lower risk.

Detroit Zoo information: 248-541-5717, www.detroitzoo.org.

Editor’s note: Animals of the Zoo is a weekly series. Next: Black and white ruffed lemur.