The Primate Diaries- Ring-Tailed Lemurs

The podcast episode discusses the ring-tailed lemur, describing its physical appearance, diet, teeth, movement, social behavior, and communication methods. It highlights the endangered status of ring-tailed lemurs and the threats they face from habitat destruction, population fragmentation, hunting, and the pet trade. The World Wildlife Fund and other organizations are working to protect them, and listeners are encouraged to support conservation efforts through donations, volunteering, sustainable choices, and using search engines like Ecosia. The episode ends with a dad joke and a preview of the next episode about chimpanzees. Welcome back to the Primate Diaries, the podcast for non-biology college majors, giving you a quick look into our world of primates. I am your host and fellow primate, Natalie Wagner. This week's episode is about one of my personal favorite primates, the ring-tailed lemur. They are quite unique-looking primates. Their bodies are mostly a gray or light brownish color with pops of white around their face and chest. Ring-tailed lemurs have rings of black around their orange eyes, much like a raccoon does. As their name implies, their long tails are alternate rings of black and white. These lemurs are around the size of a house cat, but just a tad longer with that tail. King Julian from the popular DreamWorks movie franchise, Madagascar, is one, as that helps you visualize them better. Ring-tailed lemurs are a part of the family Lemuridae. They live in southwestern Madagascar in arid, open areas and forests in territories that range from around 15 to 57 acres. There, they lead an omnivorous diet. This means that they eat both plants and animals. Ring-tailed lemurs are particularly fond of fruit and leaves from the tamarind tree, while also eat things such as bark, insects, etc. To eat this variety, as well as groom others, their teeth are uniquely suited to do so. On their lower jaw, they have a collection of teeth known as a tooth comb. This consists of four lower incisors, close together like a comb, and two narrow, elongated canines. In general, animals like primates have teeth that vary depending on what their diet consists of. But how do they get around, you may be wondering. They move quadrupedally, meaning they walk on their four limbs, their hands and feet. They move in both the trees and on land. Surprisingly, unlike most other lemurs, ring-tailed spend around 40% of their time on the ground. Everywhere you look regarding ring-tailed lemur movement, they stress this, and I found that really interesting when I was researching for this episode. Social and group arrangements is another interesting factor about these animals. Ring-tailed lemurs like to live in groups that are known as troops. They're relatively medium-sized groups, with an average around 17 lemurs, but can vary. The troop contains both male and females. The females are more dominant among ring-tailed lemurs. They communicate in several ways, through scent, body language, and calls. Ring-tailed lemurs have various scent glands on their body that they use to mark things like trees and paths they take regularly. Utilizing their long tails, they can keep their groups together when moving around familiar territory, and their facial expressions to do things such as threaten predators when necessary. Calls are the final way they communicate, allowing these lemurs to alert their troop of potential danger, depending on how they call. These well-known primates, however, are in grave danger. Ring-tailed lemurs have been classified as endangered. Overall, lemurs are the most endangered mammal group in the world. A lot of reasons why they're endangered is because of human activities in green. Habitat destruction is a primary threat to lemurs. Population fragmentation, which is essentially when populations get broken up into smaller ones due to an event, is also a major threat to these lemurs. In some regions, ring-tailed lemurs are hunted with dogs for food. They have also been found in the pet trade. If we are not careful, we will lose these animals for good. There are multiple organizations and movements trying to stop this and save ring-tailed lemurs, however. World Wildlife Fund, aka the WWF, has been working with local communities to protect them and their habitat. World Wildlife Fund also has local community patrollers to provide additional protection for them. You, my dear listener, can help. Big and small actions are out there. You can donate money to organizations such as the WWF or the Lemur Conservation Network, which helps ring-tailed lemurs, but also the various other types of them. Other options include volunteering, traveling to Madagascar, making more sustainable choices in your home, and even something as simple as switching with a search engine you use on the daily. The search engine Ecosia is a good option and it helps by planting trees in Madagascar when you search using it. Truly, no action is too small. On a lighter note, it is now time for our episode's Super Hilarious Dad Joke. This joke comes to us from JokesForUs.com. Question, why did Liam Neeson rescue his daughter? Answer, he couldn't lemur her behind. Unfortunately, our time is up for today, but join me next week for another amazing episode. We will be focusing on chimpanzees with very special guests and my good childhood friend, Curious George. Thank you so much for listening to the Primate Diaries and I will catch you next time.