sentence: Quills can still penetrate animals and humans even after death.
sentences_before: Porcupine quills are as sharp as needles, can be removed very easily, and will remain stuck in an attacker. Unlike needles, however, the quills of New World porcupines have microscopic, backwards-facing barbs on the tip that catch on the skin making them hard and painful to pull out. If a quill becomes put in the tissues of an attacker, the barbs act to pull the quill farther into the tissues with the normal muscle movements of the attacker, moving up to many millimeters in a day. Animals who try to eat porcupines have been known to die because of quill penetration and infection.
sentences_after: PA78 Goodwin, Thomas Shepard. Natural History, a Manual of Zoology. New York, 1865.
concept_name: quill
headings: Porcupine
categories: Rodents