Hystricidae are the largest terrestrial rodents, typically known or their spiny covering. They are stout, heavily built animals, with blunt rounded beads, fleshy mobile snouts, and coats of thick cylindrical or flattened spines, which form the whole covering o their body. These species are typically herbivorous, eating fruit, roots, and bulbs, and some rare cases some gnaw on bones, possibly for calcium. Females typically give birth once a year with one, two, or rarely three young. The females will give birth in an underground burrow system.