This diet is supplemented with fruits and grasses. As with most plant eating animals their diet is insufficient in salt. This causes the porcupine to have a ravenous appetite for salt. Natural salt licks, animal bones left by carnivores, yellow pond lilies, and other items of high salt content are attractive to porcupines. Some human products such as paints, plywood adhesives and the sweated on clothing of humans have a strong appeal for porcupines.
Porcupines are slow-footed, and stocky animals.
They spend much of their life in trees. They are equipped by their Creator with very sharp and formidable incisors. These teeth are used for stripping bark and foliage from tree. Though the porcupine is slow moving it is not helpless in defending itself. The well known defensive weapon of the porcupine is its specialized hairs or quills.