Sciurillus

Sciurillus is a genus of tree squirrel containing a single living species, the Neotropical pygmy squirrel, and forms its own subfamily, Sciurillinae, within the squirrel family Sciuridae. It is native to northern South America, found in four separated regions spanning French Guiana, Suriname, central Brazil, northern Peru and southern Colombia, where it lives in lowland tropical rainforest. It is the smallest tree squirrel native to the Americas, with a head and body length of about ten centimeters, an eleven centimeter tail, and a weight of thirty to forty eight grams. Genetic analysis has shown it to be the sister group to all other living squirrels, making it an important lineage for understanding squirrel evolution.