Rungwecebus
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Rungwecebus".

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Kipunji

Conservation status
Not evaluated (IUCN 3.1)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Primates
Family: Cercopithecidae
Genus: Rungwecebus
Davenport, 2006
Species: R. kipunji
Binomial name
Rungwecebus kipunji
(Jones et al., 2005)

The Kipunji (Rungwecebus kipunji) is a species of Old World monkey that lives in the highland forests of Tanzania. Also known as the Highland Mangabey, it is about three feet long and has long brown fur, which stands in tufts on the sides and top of its head. Its face and eyelids are uniformly black. The Kipunji is arboreal in its habits. All the males of this mangabey species emit a loud call to coordinate spacing between different groups. The Kipunji has a unique call, described as a 'honk-bark', which distinguishes it from its close relatives the Grey-cheeked Mangabey and the Black Crested Mangabey, whose calls are described as 'whoop-gobbles'.

Approximately 1,100 of the animals live in the highland Ndundulu Forest Reserve, an unprotected forest adjacent to Udzungwa Mountains National Park, and in a disjunct population 250 miles away on Mount Rungwe and in Kitulo National Park, which is adjacent to it. The forest at Rungwe is highly degraded, and fragmentation of the remaining forest threatens to split that population into three smaller populations. The Ndundulu forest is in better shape, but the population there is smaller. The monkey will likely be classified as a critically endangered species. Recently, a Wildlife Conservation Society team found that the monkey’s range is restricted to just 6.82 square miles (17.69 square kilometers) of forest in the two isolated regions.[1]

The Kipunji was independently discovered by researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society, the University of Georgia and Conservation International, in December 2003 and July 2004, making it the first new African monkey species discovered since the Sun-tailed Monkey in 1984.[2] Originally assigned to the genus Lophocebus,[2] genetic and morphological tests showed that it is more closely related to the baboons (genus Papio) than to the other mangabeys in the genus Lophocebus and that the genus is diphyletic, meaning that species with differing genealogies have been mistakenly lumped together. Scientists have assigned it to a new genus, Rungwecebus, named after Mount Rungwe, where it is found.[3]

Rungwecebus is the first new monkey genus to be discovered since Allen's Swamp Monkey in 1923, according to researchers.[4]

References

  1. ^ Newly Discovered Monkey Is Threatened with Extinction Newswise, Retrieved on July 28, 2008.
  2. ^ a b Jones, Trevor; Carolyn L. Ehardt, Thomas M. Butynski, Tim R. B. Davenport, Noah E. Mpunga, Sophy J. Machaga, Daniela W. De Luca (2005). "The Highland Mangabey Lopocebus kipunji: A New Species of African Monkey". Science 308 (5725): 1161–1164. doi:10.1126/science.1109191. PMID 15905399. 
  3. ^ Davenport, Tim R. B.; William T. Stanley, Eric J. Sargis, Daniela W. De Luca, Noah E. Mpunga, Sophy J. Machaga, and Link E. Olson (2006). "A New Genus of African Monkey, Rungwecebus: Morphology, Ecology, and Molecular Phylogenetics". Science 312: 1378. doi:10.1126/science.1125631. PMID 16690815. 
  4. ^ Than, Ker (May 11, 2006). "Scientists Discover New Monkey Genus In Africa". LiveScience. Retrieved on 2008-07-24.

External links

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