The remote Ankarana preserve on the island of Madagascar, a few hundred miles off the coast of Africa, shelters an astonishing array of exotic wild animals. Protected by a fortress of ancient coral mountains with forbidding razor-sharp spires, some of these unusual creatures have thrived unscathed and unchanged for thousands of years. Aggressive Nile crocodiles, incredibly rare crowned lemurs, countless chameleons, and the lethal fossa, described as a ''mongoose on steroids,'' share the lush forests and deep, forbidding caves of Ankarana.

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