Primate ecologist Dr Laura Marsh of the Global Conservation Institute in Santa Fe, NM, has described five new species of the genus Pithecia (saki monkeys) from Brazil, Bolivia and Peru.
by Sci-News.com
Saki monkeys, or sakis, are a poorly studied group of primates native to South America.
Found in tropical forests from the Guiana Shield, west to the foothills of the Andes in Ecuador and Peru, south to northern Bolivia, and throughout the Amazon Basin in Brazil as far east as Altamira on the Rio Xingu, these fast moving, medium-sized primates have fascinated scientists for years.
Also known as ‘flying monkeys,’ they can quickly flee an area through the treetops in a series of leaps of up to 9 meters.
They form small groups of 2 to 9 individuals, generally comprising a single male-female breeding pair and several young.
A new ten-year taxnonomic study, carried out by Dr Marsh and based upon a large number of museum specimens and photographs of live sakis, recognizes 16 distinct species: five previously established, three reinstated, three elevated from subspecies level, and five newly described species.
|