RING-TAILED LEMUR (Lemur catta)
RING-TAILED LEMUR
(Lemur catta)
Like most of the animals on this page, lemurs are primitive primates, or prosimians. They live on the island of Madagascar, which has more prosimians than anywhere else. The ring-tailed lemur has a catlike face and a gray and white body. Its most eyecatching feature is its bushy, upright tail, which has bold gray and black rings. Ring-tailed lemurs are unusual because they are active during the day and feed on the ground. They eat leaves, fruit, and sugary sap, which they get by biting through bark. They live in troops of up to 20 animals.
GRAY MOUSE LEMUR
(Microcebus murinus)
Mouse lemurs are among the world's smallest primates. They look very much like mice, but they have forward-facing eyes, tiny fingers and toes, and long tails with fluffy tips. They often weigh less than 2 ounces - about 6,000 times less than the largest primate, the gorilla. Like many prosimians, mouse lemurs are active at night. They eat a wide range of food, including insects, fruit, and leaves. They give birth to two or three young after a gestation period of about eight months, a long time for animals of their size.
The indri looks like a gray and black teddy bear, with a very small tail and large, rounded ears. As well as being Madagascar's largest primate, it is the loudest, with an extraordnary song that can be heard more than 1.25 miles away. Indris sing to claim a territory in the treetops for their family groups. They feed during the day, eating leaves, buds and fruit.
The aye-aye is about the size of a cat. It lives in Madagascan rain forests, feeding on fruit, birds eggs, and insects. The aye-aye's middle fingers are much longer than the others. It uses these extra-long fingers to tap against trees. If it hears movement beneath the bark it probes inside with a finger and pulls out its prey.
The bushbaby is one of 11 primates that live on the mainland of Africa. It got its name from its bushy tail and childlike cry. the bushbaby resembles a large squirrel. It feeds at night, using its keen sense to find fruit, insects and sweet tree sap. Like most primates, bushbabies climb well because they have opposable thumbs. This means their thumbs close around branches opposite their fingers, increasing their grip.
Most primates are fast-moving animals, but the slender loris is not. It creeps along branches on its spindly legs, rarely coming to the ground. The slender loris has a flat face with large eyes, and hardly any tail. It spends the day asleep. At night, it ambushes insects and other small animals to eat. Instead of using its teeth to catch prey, the slender loris lunges forward and grabs its victims with its hands.
This small, African primate has soft, woolly fur, slender arms and legs, and almost no tail. It has five toes on each foot, but its hands are unusual, with two long fingers and two much shorter fingers, one of which is little more than a fleshy pad. Despite this, the angwantibo, is a good climber, moving slowly and stealthily through trees and bushes. It feeds mainly on insects, either picking them off twigs and leaves or, occasionally, grabbing them as they fly past.
Tarsiers are insect-eating primates from the forests of Southeast Asia. Although they are small enough to fit into a pocket, they have long tails, large fingers and toes, and enormous eyes-characteristics that suit their unusual way of life. Instead of climbing along branches to find insects, tarsiers look and listen for them in the dark. Once they have spotted a likely meal, they leap through the air to catch their prey. They can jump distances of up to 17 feet and they feed sitting up, chewing with their tiny teeth. Tarsiers give birth to a single baby each year, after a gestation period of about six months.
Marmosets and tamarins are found only in Central and South America. Many of them look like small monkeys with extra-long tails, but unlike true monkeys, they do not have grasping hands and feet. Instead of clinging to branches, they scamper along the top. The pygmy marmoset, the smallest species, is the tiniest primate anywhere in the Americas. It has gray-brown fur that camouflages it among the branches, and yellowish hands and feet. Like other marmosets, it feeds during the day, eating insects, fruit, sugary nectar, and sap.
This rare animal is one of the world's most beautiful and endangered primates. It has a luxurious coat of orange-yellow fur, with a flowing mane and a long, silky tail. Golden lion tamarins come from forests on the Atlantic coast of Brazil - a habitat that has alomost vanished in the last 25 years. To make matters worse, many golden lion tamarins have been caught and sold as pets. It is now illegal to catch or buy golden lion tamarins, and an international breeding program is working to save the species.
This black-furred monkey is one of more than 40 species that live in Central and South America. Unlike monkeys from Africa and Asia, these New World monkeys all have nostrils that open sideways. Many of them, including the woolly monkey, also have prehensile tails. Their tails work like an extra leg, helping them hang on to branches as they feed. Woolly monkeys live in large troops and feed mainly on fruit and seeds. They have one baby each time they breed, and the mother carries her newborn infant on her chest or back.
No other monkey can rival this species for sheer acrobatic skill. It can swing arm-over-arm through the treetops faster than a person can run, and it can hang from branches by its tail, leaving its arms and legs dangling in the air. Like the woolly monkey, its tail has a bare patch near the tip, which gives it a good grip. Spider monkeys feed mainly on fruit and nuts, and they live in troops up to 30 strong.
Howler monkeys are named for their loud calls, which ring out over the treetops at dawn and late in the day. To produce the calls, they use a resonating chamber in their throat. It acts like a built-in amplifier, allowing the sound to be heard up to 2 miles away. There are six species of howlers. They are the largest New World monkeys and also the most sluggish. They survive almost entirely on leaves, so they never have to travel far to find their food. The red howler is a deep rusty color, but other howlers are black, brown or gray.
This is one of the smallest New World monkeys, measuring as little as 12 inches from the top of its head to the base of its tail. However, its total length more than doubles if its tail is included. Squirrel monkeys' tails are not prehensile, so they cannot grasp things with them. Instead, they use them for balance when they sit or climb. In undisturbed forests, squirrel monkeys form large troops, numbering up to 500 animals.
This South American monkey is instantly recognizable by its bald, bright red head and face. It is also the only monkey in the Americas that does not have a long tail. Uakaris live in parts of the Amazon rain forest that are flooded during the wet season. They are shy, unaggressive monkeys and they feed mainly on seeds and nuts. They stay in the treetops, hardly ever coming to the ground.
**All Facts and Information contained in this website can be found in the following reference materials: The Kingfisher Illustrated Animal Encyclopedia and The Complete Book of Animals from The American Education Publishers
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Uakari