primates:
A typical adult human recognizes that the image one sees in a mirror is oneself. We do not know how much training a mirror-naive adult requires to do this, but we think very little. When a typical adult macaque (a species of monkey) looks in...
Read on »
Posted on August 20, 2008 1:00 PM • 25 Comments •
The future for a large primate in a tiny patch of African forest looks bleak. Just three years after it was discovered, Tanzania's kipunji monkey is threatened with extinction ... researchers conducted more than 2,800 hours of fieldwork in the Southern Highlands and Udzungwa Mountains...
Posted on August 18, 2008 10:07 PM • 0 Comments •
Austrian Franz Sikora was a fossil hunter and merchant of ancient bones working in the 19th centuyr. In 1899 he found the first known specimen, which was to become the type fossil, of Hadropithecus stenognathus in Madagascar. This is an extinct lemur. To be honest,...
Read on »
Posted on July 30, 2008 11:49 PM • 1 Comments •
Perhaps judging a man by his cologne isn't as superficial as it seems. Duke University researchers, using sophisticated machinery to analyze hundreds of chemical components in a ringtailed lemur's distinctive scent, have found that individual males are not only advertising their fitness for fatherhood,...
Posted on June 27, 2008 7:51 PM • 1 Comments •
This is a photograph of wild western lowland gorillas copulating in, sort of, the missionary position. This shot was taken in the Nouabale-Ndoki National Park in the Republic of Congo....
Read on »
Posted on February 28, 2008 2:16 PM • 4 Comments •
A DNA phylogeny based on over 200 species of lemurs and related species is now available....
Read on »
Posted on February 28, 2008 9:16 AM • 1 Comments •
Is chimpanzee food sharing an example of food for sex? One of the most important transitions in human evolution may have been the incorporation of regular food sharing into the day to day ecology of our species or our ancestors. Although this has been recognized...
Read on »
Posted on January 21, 2008 11:27 AM • 1 Comments •
Two hundred pound robot lumbering along on tread mill, doing the bidding of a monkey several thousand miles away.An international and interdisciplinary team of scientists have developed a robot that will carry out physical activities in imitation of the activities of a monkey. The monkey...
Read on »
Posted on January 18, 2008 8:25 AM • 2 Comments •
Traveling from Ecuador to Africa, Jane Goodall takes the audience on an ecological journey, discussing highlights and low points of her experiences in the jungle. She shows how progress is helping research (DNA analysis) and hurting the environment (clear-cutting). And she draws a dozen parallels...
Read on »
Posted on January 16, 2008 6:00 PM • 1 Comments •
There is a new baby orangutan born at the Como Zoo in Saint Paul, Minnesota. I mention this for the edification of my local readers (who probably already know about it) and not as a statement of support or opposition to zoos, orangutans, or babies....
Posted on January 14, 2008 12:00 PM • 3 Comments •
