Ring-tailed lemur

Ring-tailed lemur

Description

The ring-tailed lemur is the most recognisable of Madagascar's lemurs, instantly known by its long tail ringed with 13 to 14 alternating black and white bands. Its fur is grey to rosy-brown with a white belly and a striking black-and-white face mask around bright orange eyes. The body measures around 40 cm, the tail is even longer at roughly 55 to 60 cm, and adults weigh about 2.2 kg. Unlike most lemurs, it spends much of the day on the ground.

Habitat

It lives only in southern and south-western Madagascar, in dry deciduous forests, spiny thickets and gallery forests along rivers. It also tolerates rocky, semi-desert terrain and copes with wider temperature swings than other lemurs. Habitat loss, hunting and the pet trade have made it an endangered species.

Diet

It is an omnivore with a mainly plant-based diet. Fruit and leaves form the core of its menu, above all the fruit and foliage of the tamarind tree, supplemented by flowers, herbs, bark, sap and the occasional insect. During the dry season it relies heavily on tamarind.

Reproduction

Breeding is strictly seasonal. After a gestation of about 135 days a single infant is usually born, twins less often. The young lemur first clings to its mother's belly and later rides on her back. Females live in matriarchal troops in which they dominate the males.

Lifespan

In the wild it lives around 16 years, while in human care it commonly exceeds 20 years and exceptionally reaches about 27.

Did you know?

Males hold so-called "stink fights": they coat their tails with strongly scented secretions from glands on their wrists and waft them at rivals to drive them off. Ring-tailed lemurs also love to sunbathe sitting upright with their arms spread wide, as if meditating.