Crab-eating Macaque
Macaca fascicularis
Summary 3
The crab-eating macaque (Macaca fascicularis), also known as the long-tailed macaque, is a cercopithecine primate native to Southeast Asia. It is referred to as the cynomolgus monkey in laboratories. It has a long history alongside humans; they have been alternately seen as agricultural pests, sacred animals in some temples, and more recently, the subject of medical experiments. The crab-eating macaque lives in matrilineal social groups with a female dominance hierarchy, and male members leave the group...
Habitat 4
Long-tailed macaques are "ecologically diverse." Some of the habitats in which they have been found are primary forests, disturbed and secondary forests, and riverine and coastal forests of nipa palm and mangrove. Long-tailed macaques live most successfully in disturbed habitats and on the periphery of forests.
In Sumatra, they achieve their highest population densities in mixed mangrove swamps, secondary hill forests, and riverine forests. Some were also observed in freshwater swamps, scrub grassland, lowland primary forests, and rubber groves.
In Thailand, long-tailed macaques occur in evergreen forests, bamboo forests, and in deciduous forests.
In Malaysia, they are abundant in coastal lowland forests.
This species has been observed drinking much water and eating crabs, they often live near bodies of water. Of the various habitats occupied by long-tailed macaques, the swamp forests seem to have the highest density of them.
In recent years, habitat alteration has expanded the range of some populations of long-tailed macaques. In Malaysia, cleared land, such as plantation areas, has been colonized by this species. It has been observed that some disturbed habitats have higher troop and population sizes than some pristine forests.
This species has the highest degree of arboreality of all macaque species. One study of long-tailed macaque behavior reported that they never came to the ground except within 5 m of the edge of a river near their tree. The population densities of this diurnal species vary from 10 to 400 per squared kilometer.
Habitat Regions: tropical ; terrestrial
Terrestrial Biomes: forest ; rainforest ; scrub forest
Aquatic Biomes: coastal ; brackish water
Wetlands: swamp
Other Habitat Features: agricultural ; riparian
Physical description 5
The body fur of long-tailed macaques tends to be grey-brown to reddish brown. These colors are always paler ventrally. The face is brownish-grey with cheek whiskers. The eyes are directed forward for binocular vision. The nose is flat and the nostrils are narrow and close together (catarrhine condition). Long-tailed macaques have shovel-shaped incisors, conspicuous canines, and bilophodont molars. The tooth formula is I 2/2, C 1/1, PM 2/2, and M 3/3.
The body length, not including the tail, is 40 to 47 cm. The greyish- brown or reddish colored tail is 50 to 60 cm. Long-tailed macaques exhibit sexual dimorphism in size. The average weight for males is 4.8 to 7 kg and 3 to 4 kg for females, approximately 69% of average male weight.
Range mass: 3 to 7 kg.
Range length: 40 to 47 cm.
Other Physical Features: endothermic ; homoiothermic; bilateral symmetry
Sexual Dimorphism: male larger
Sources and Credits
- (c) Lip Kee Yap, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/64565252@N00/2374304012
- (c) Bernard DUPONT, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/berniedup/8217712282/
- Adapted by Brian Martin from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macaca_fascicularis
- (c) The Regents of the University of Michigan and its licensors, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/18656213
- (c) The Regents of the University of Michigan and its licensors, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/18656214
