When you work with lemurs, once a year there is always this exciting moment when you discover that the family has grown and one of the female lemurs is carrying a baby lemur. It happened to me when, on a normal day in May, I was giving breakfast to the ring tailed lemurs and discovered that the oldest female had a tiny lemur stuck to her chest.
His big eyes were staring at me and his mother was watching me closely to try to figure out my intentions.
What is a lemur?
Before telling more about this tiny animal I am taking care of, you should know some basic things about lemurs. Lemurs are primates, because they share a common ancestral with monkeys like baboons, chimpanzees and mandrills, but they evolved in another direction. So they are primates but not monkeys.
The ring tailed lemurs are one of the most famous lemur species in zoos. They are very characteristic and easy to recognize because of their long stripped black and white tail.
After some weeks we could finally discover that it was a male and give him a proper name: Yoshi.
Facts about the ring tailed lemurs
- You can only find them in Madagascar.
- They can live up to 20 years in captivity and 10 years in the wild.
- They are very social animals.
- The females are the dominant ones in the group.
- They are active during the day.
- They spend most of their time on the ground.
- When they travel as a group, they keep their tales in the air so they can see each other and stay together.
- They love to sit in the sun in a “Buddha” position.
- They have strong scent glands that they use for communication.
- During mating season, males cover their tales with their scent and wave them to see who of them is more powerful.
- The group sleeps together with their tales on the outside to scare predators
- Usually they eat plants and fruit, but sometimes they also eat insects or meat.
- They are one of the most vocal primates, with 28 different calls.
- The word lemur means ghost, because of how they look.
- They are listed as endangered by the IUNC Red List due to habitat destruction, hunting and pet trade.
Species of lemurs
There are around 100 species of lemurs, including subspecies. You have them in all sizes. For example, the smallest lemur is the Madame Berthe’s mouse lemur that is only 10 cm high.
The largest is the Indri, about 73 cm.
Sadly, lemurs are the most endangered mammal group in the world, with 24 species listed as critically endangered, 49 as endangered and 20 as vulnerable.
How is the live of a baby lemur?
When a baby lemur is born the whole group wants to have a look at the new born, smelling and touching it. A baby is always an exciting thing!! This also happened when Yoshi was born. His mother Daisy, his father Luigi and his two siblings Mario and Malina were very curious about the new addition to the family. Especially his bigger sister Malina was most of the time trying to be close to him. Daisy permitted that, but sometimes she would think it was enough intrusion and make herself perfectly clear.
1. Pregnancy and birth
When Daisy gave birth to Yoshi after four and a half months of gestation, we were happy to see that he was looking healthy. Before Yoshi, she only gave birth to the twins Mario and Malina two years ago. For lemurs it is normal to give birth to one baby, but it is also frequent to have twins. As soon as Yoshi was born he had his eyes wide open, he had the same colour as the adults and he was holding his mom tightly.
2. Relationship with the rest of the family
Yoshi, like all baby lemurs, spent his first weeks grabbed to his mother´s chest.
After two weeks he also started to move to his mother´s back or the back of his father and siblings.
When he was three weeks old, he began to eat solid food and he would leave for brief moments his mother’s back to explore the world, always with his mother keeping a close eye on him. Yoshi is now four months old and by six months he will be completely independent. In the wild, being a male, he would eventually migrate to another group.
Females stay in the same group. Yoshi, though, doesn´t have to worry about leaving the group, because he lives in a zoo and will stay with his family.
Curiosities
When baby lemurs start to eat solid food, they eat the same things as the adults, mostly fruit and vegetables. Yoshi loves fruit, especially grapes and apple, but he also likes to eat his carrots.
If a baby lemur is orphaned, the rest of the group will take care of it and one of the females will replace the mother.
What do you think about these primates?
Who else does enjoy working with ring tailed lemurs? If you like primates, you can leave a comment about which one you would like me to talk about. Or maybe you would like me to tell more about ring tailed lemurs and this group. In my next posts I will talk about animal enrichment, how I keep animals busy and tell something about a small monkey species called marmoset.
