# What Do North American Porcupines Eat?

> What north american porcupines eat: Herbivore — tree bark, leaves, buds, and green plants, foraging style, and seasonal shifts in Forests, shrublands, and tundra across North America.

- **Species:** North American Porcupine (*Erethizon dorsatum*)
- **Conservation status:** Least Concern
- **Diet:** Herbivore — tree bark, leaves, buds, and green plants
- **Habitat:** Forests, shrublands, and tundra across North America
- **Lifespan:** 15–18 years in the wild
- **Top speed:** Up to 3 km/h (2 mph) on ground; agile in trees
- **Canonical HTML:** https://globalanimalguide.org/animals/porcupine/what-do-porcupine-eat/
- **Parent profile:** https://globalanimalguide.org/animals/porcupine/
- **Last reviewed:** 2026-07-16

## Quick answer

The North American porcupine is a slow, nearsighted rodent armed with roughly 30,000 barbed quills covering its back and tail. It climbs trees to eat bark and leaves, defends by backing into predators, and lives across forests and tundra from Alaska to Mexico.

## Who should skip this page

Skip this if you need a captive feeding plan from a veterinarian. This page is wild diet, not a pet-care sheet.

## Quill defence

Quills are modified hairs with barbed tips that embed and migrate in attackers — painful and difficult to remove. Porcupines cannot shoot quills; predators must contact the raised tail. Fishers are skilled porcupine hunters, attacking the unquilled face.

## Help protect the North American Porcupine

Even familiar animals lose ground as wild habitat keeps shrinking worldwide.

[Donate to wildlife protection](https://worldanimalrescuenetwork.org/donate/)

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Source: Global Animal Guide (https://globalanimalguide.org/animals/porcupine/what-do-porcupine-eat/). Licensed CC BY-NC 4.0 — free for non-commercial reuse with attribution.