By Sarah Griffiths PUBLISHED: 09:19 EST, 15 August 2013 | UPDATED: 12:15 EST, 15 August 2013 Hidden away in the cloud forests of Colombia and described as half cat, half teddy bear, the olinguito is the first new carnivore to be discovered in the Western Hemisphere in 35 years. The cute creature has been wrongly identified for 100 years, despite having been spotted in the wild, tucked into museum collections and even exhibited in zoos. But now scientists at the Smithsonian Institute have confirmed the loveable carnivorous mammal is a new species and have said it is 'an incredibly rare discovery in the 21st Century'.
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U.S. scientists said the carnivorous olinguito looks like a cross between a house cat and a teddy bear but is a member of the same family as raccoons
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The creature, which has woolly orange brown fur lives in the cloud forests of Colombia and Ecuador, and is named 'neblina,' which means fog in Spanish
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Scientists at the Smithsonian said the mammal is most active at night, eats mainly fruit, rarely comes out of the trees and has one baby at a time
Eventually, the team discovered olinguitos living in an @placeholder forest and spent a number of days observing the creatures.