Siamang Monkey Research Paper

A few weeks ago, I spent a lovely Monday afternoon observing two different primates at the Santa Ana Zoo. I got to the zoo around two in the afternoon, and to my surprise, the zoo was decently crowded. The Santa Ana Zoo is smaller in comparison to other zoos like the Los Angeles Zoo, but still had a decent amount of animals there. Covering a small 20 acres of land, I came across two primates that fit perfectly for the purposes of this course project. I chose to observe an endangered ape, the white-handed gibbon, and an endangered new world monkey, the golden-headed lion tamarin.

Chimpanzees are great apes that are the closest living relatives to humans (Larsen, 2014). These primates have been studied and observed intently for decades, and there are many theories that explain why they are the way they are. Chimpanzees learn the necessary skills of survival through social and cultural contexts and pass these traits along to their offspring. In researching these smart and interesting primates I have understood the social and cultural roles chimpanzees have that are necessary for survival. The mother- infant bond is crucial to the development of young chimpanzees and these females are known for teaching their young social roles and behavior, communication

I primarily observed three orangutans, one male, one female, and one juvenile, of Sumatran and Bornean descent, scientifically known as Pongo abelli and Pongo pygmaeus, respectively, and to a lesser extent, two gibbons known as siamangs, or Symphalangus syndactylus. These primates share the same enclosure in the San Diego Zoo in California. I observed the orangutans from 12:58 P.M. to 2:00 P.M. CST on September 19th. During this time frame, the three orangutans mainly stayed high up in their man-made structures, consisting of multiple metal bars covered with nets, ropes, and hammocks. The female and juvenile orangutans stayed above ground from 12:58 P.M. to 1:31 P.M., and again from 1:48 P.M. until 2:00 P.M, approximately 45 minutes. During

The capuchin monkey is a New World monkey that belongs in the subfamily Cebinae. An adult capuchin monkey can grow anywhere between 12.6 to 22 inches in height excluding the tail, which can be anywhere from 15 to 22 inches in length. On average a capuchin monkey will have a body mass ranging from 2.4 to 7.3 pounds. Like all new world monkeys, the capuchin monkey has a 2:1:3:3 dental formulas which indicates that it has two incisors, one canine three premolars and three molars. Interestingly, the brain size of a capuchin monkeys is slightly larger than that of other new world monkeys. On average, male’s heads are larger than females, in fact they are 34% larger in body size and have canines that are 22% sharper than females . Capuchin monkeys

The animal I have chosen to study is the Japanese macaque, more commonly known as the Japanese snow monkey. Sir David Attenborough recently described the macaque as “one of the most successful and versatile of all primates”, commending its capacity to be “versatile, resilient, enterprising, tough and capable of surviving in extreme conditions”. This essay will continue by examining the Japanese macaque in a number of ways. Firstly, I will describe the physical characteristics of the animal, paying particular attention to the way in which their appearance has adapted to enable them to dominate in their habitat. Secondly, I will discuss the environment in which the macaques live in and the unique capabilities they maximise to develop a

Isbell and Wright’s articles both focus on monkey species and their native environments, Africa for Isbell’s (1994) vervet Old World monkey and South America, Peru area, for Wright’s (1994) owl and titis monkeys. The articles main focus is the relationship between these monkeys and their natural predators. Focusing on how the predator aspect of their lives is determined by their environment and adaptations they make to ensure survival. Isbell’s Vervets Year of Doom focuses more on the adaptations that was forced upon the vervets’ because of their changing environment, the death of fever trees. While Wright’s Night Watch on the Amazon focusses more on how the primates way of life affects their relationship with predators and the likelihood of attacks. Both articles have similar aspects however the species way of life, specifically their environment and sleep schedule, are quite different as well as the authors way of observing and studying the primates within their habitats.

Primate conservation has long been a topic of debate, reliant most heavily on the struggle to provide the necessary resources to combat the declining rate of population growth among various species. Orangutans in particular, both Sumatran and Bornean, have experienced a rapid drop in their free-living populations. With an estimate of only 27,000 left in the wild, questions have been raised over what selective pressures are impacting the steady decline of these animals existence. While hunting and poaching have been identified as contributing factors, habitat loss primarily takes center stage in their demise. Conservation efforts have been made and continue to be somewhat successful, however, challenges and set backs continue to threaten

The Bornean Orangutan lives on the island of Borneo, a part of Malaysia and an Indonesian province. The Sumatran Orangutan lives on the island of Sumatra in Indonesia. They can be found in the heavily canopied rain forests, low elevation forests, and sometimes in grasslands . Due to their surroundings, the diet of the Orangutan consists of over 500 plant species, with fruits being the primary staple food but they also eat leaves, bark, insects and flowers. The results of this diet mean that they are one of the main distributors of seeds throughout the forest, creating the cycle of growth to maintain their food source. In their environments orangutans are not known to form large communities, but small groups with specific

They are clean primates that like grooming, and while observing them in the morning they would groom each other for about 10 minutes. They clean the hair of one another using their fingers. Just like any other primates, the Siamangs also do sleep, and based on the observation that I had they sleep for up to around 8hours. They sleep alone with one individual hurdled on each other on the tree trunk, sitting up right. The male and female have a

The primates species that I observed were the Bornean orangutans and the Sumatran orangutans. There were three adult females. one adult male, and one infant female. The orangutans were observed at San Diego zoo’s ape webcam on April 26, 2106.

The focal orangutan that I observed for a period of twenty minutes appeared to not be very active and choosing to remain behind the trunk of one of the fake trees. During the observation at no point did I witness it forage for food or look for any food but this would be mostly

The Jane Goodall Institute website provides information about the projects regarding the protection of chimpanzees and other primates. Based on the institute’s initiative to protect the primates by providing education to the community, supporting sanctuaries, and working with law enforcements (website JGI). Furthermore, the information provided on the program Roots & Shoots points out a guide to those interested in helping the wild life, and provides aid to elaborate new plans to help the primates. The first step is to acknowledge the problem, in this case is finding a way to protect the chimpanzees. Second, to elaborate a pan, the JGI conservation program uses technology such as cloud computing and remote sensing to provide up to date information on the

Scopes Trial, or the Monkey Trials, was a trial about teaching Darwin’s Evolution Theory in public schools (ushistory.org).

Michele Allen’s work has been a blessing to many dogs who could’ve been stuck in a shelter for the rest of their lives.

“The Monkey’s Paw,” teaches you the lesson of being careful of what you wish for because the outcome may be very dreadful. A strange Monkey’s paw that grants wishes would seem a little bogus to me. The myths of this paw granting the beholder three wishes, anything you can think of. The beholder gets their wish; only to have consequences to pay for the granted wish. The wishes leave the beholder in either shock or grief. Only leading up to the person granting the wishes, to regret that they ever came up the Monkey’s