Long lost primate rediscovered in Indonesia

November 19, 2008 by Stil7

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A team led by a Texas A&M University anthropologist has discovered a group of primates not seen alive in 85 years. These furry gremlin-looking creatures are about the size of a small mouse and weighing less than 2 ounces, have not been observed since they were last collected for a museum in 1921.

The pygmy tarsier, one of the planet’s smallest and rarest primates was assumed to be extinct until 2000 when two scientists studying rats accidently trapped and killed an individual. Gursky-Doyen’s team spent two months using 276 mist nets to capture the small creatures so they could be fitted with radio collars and tracked. One other individual was spotted but eluded capture.

The collars were being attached so the tarsiers’ movements could be tracked.

Tarsiers are unusual primates — the mammalian group that includes lemurs, monkeys, apes and people. The handful of tarsier species live on various Asian islands.

The Pygmy Tarsier, also known as the Mountain Tarsier or the Lesser Spectral Tarsier, is a nocturnal primate found on central Sulawesi, Indonesia, in an area with lower vegetative species diversity than the lowland tropical forests. They are unusual among primates in that they have claws rather than finger nails.