Perrier’s sifaka, Propithecus perrieri
PERRIER'S SIFAKA
Propithecus perrieri
Geographic Distribution and Habitat
The Perrier’s sifaka has a very restricted range in northeastern Madagascar. Their range extends from the eastern edges of the Analamerana limestone massif, a compact group of mountains along the Indian Ocean coast to the sandstone forests of the Andrafiamena mountains as far west as the peaks of Ambohibe, which are northeast of the rural commune of Marivorahona. What a Malagasy mouthful! They are bound in the north by the Irodo River, and in the south by the Andrafiamena mountain range.
Their limited range is concentrated on the Analamerana Special Reserve managed by Madagascar National Parks, as well as the Andriafiamena Protected Area managed by the non-governmental organization Fanamby. Within this range, they are found in dry deciduous and semi-humid tropical forests on limestone and sandstone soils.
The Perrier’s sifaka was once considered to be a subspecies of the diademed sifaka (P. diadema) purely based on their morphology (size and structure). Eventually, they were classified as a distinct species.
Size, Weight, and Lifespan
The Perrier’s sifaka has a head-body length ranging between 16.96-18.14 inches (43-46 cm), with an almost equally long bushy tail, ranging between 16.54-18.11 inches (42-46 cm)! They weigh between 6.6-8.8 pounds (3-4 kg), with females being slightly heavier than males on average. This difference in weight between the two genders is an example of sexual dimorphism, a noticeable physical difference between genders other than their genitalia.
The lifespan of the Perrier’s sifaka in the wild is not known, but their close cousin, the diademed sifaka, lives to be around 15 years of age.
Appearance
The Perrier’s sifaka is a medium-sized lemur, with a deep, shiny fur coat covering much of the body and their looong tail. Along the underside of the body, the coat is shorter and is characterized by a rosy brown hue. The face is naked and black in color, with striking orange-red eyes. The ears of some individuals are furred, while in others, they remain furless.
Compared to other lemurs, sifakas have powerful legs which are longer than their arms. These long legs provide them with the strength and maneuverability to propel themselves distances of over 20 feet (6.1 m) between trees, all while keeping their body upright—a special type of locomotion known as vertical clinging. These specially designed legs also allow for a unique method of bounding on the ground, bipedally (on two legs) hopping sideways, with their arms outstretched for balance. One could even call it a dance! Sifakas also possess semi-prehensile thumbs and enlarged big toes that enable them to strongly grasp branches at high speeds.
Diet
The diet of the Perrier’s sifaka is a green and fruity one like that of other sifakas, consisting primarily of young and mature leaves, fruit, stems, and flowers. They occasionally supplement their diet with bark and seeds. Their menu contains at least a dozen different plant varieties, representing nine scientific families! What a diverse, cultured, and classy palate!
In general, sifakas have a seasonal variation in their diet, and the Perrier’s sifaka is no exception. During the wet season, the Perrier’s sifaka dedicates most (~70%-90%) of their feeding time to fruits and seeds, while in the dry season, most of their feeding time is spent on leaves and flowers.
They are also picky eaters in one aspect, often choosing young leaves over more mature foliage. This preference allows them to obtain the necessary nutrients from their food while minimizing the intake of toxins present in older leaves. Now that’s smarts!
Behavior and Lifestyle
The Perrier’s sifaka is diurnal (active during the day) and primarily arboreal (tree-dwelling), using their powerful legs to leap between branches with amazing agility while using their tail to balance. Their strong limbs, as well as the specialized structure of their wrists, enable them to perform vertical leaps of up to 30 feet (9.14 m)!
Perrier’s sifakas typically start their day basking in the sunlight of the early morning before setting off to travel, forage, and engage in various social interactions. During the dry season, they will descend to the forest floor to drink water from riverbeds or reach other parts of the forest. On the ground, their striking black fur makes them highly visible and vulnerable to predators such as humans, fossas, and feral dogs. To escape these predators, they may give an alarm call, followed by beating a hasty retreat to the trees, or may even use those amazing legs of theirs to perform the sifaka’s unique distinctive two-legged sideways bound. At night, they locate secure sleeping spots in the trees and often curl up together to conserve heat and provide protection against predators.
According to one resource, the following activity budget was recorded for the Perrier’s sifaka: 39.6% of their time was dedicated to resting, 32.8% was spent foraging, 19% of their time was spent traveling within their home range, 4.7% was dedicated to “other” activity, and 2.5% was spent engaging in social activity.
Gesundheit! Sifakas got their name from the “shee-fak” call used to maintain contact within their group, but those who have been fortunate enough to hear it say the call sounds more like a sneeze!
Girl power: Female Perrier’s sifakas are dominant over males.
Perrier’s sifakas live in groups ranging between two to six individuals within a home range of around 74 acres (30 ha). These groups typically contain one to three adult females and one to two adult males, with only one male-female pair serving as the breeding pair.
Group territories are maintained by males using scent glands along their throat and chest to mark trees. However, aggression, along with encounters between neighboring groups, are both low.
With regard to emigration (leaving the homegroup), males emigrate to a neighboring group at five years of age, while females may either emigrate or remain in their natal group.
Perrier’s sifakas apparently tolerate the presence of both crowned lemurs (Eulemur coronatus) and Sanford’s brown lemurs (E. sanfordi) during periods of travel, feeding and resting. These associations last anywhere from a few (two to three) to several (25-30) minutes in duration.
As of writing this article, there have been no systematic studies of Perrier’s sifaka vocalizations. However, several calls have been recognized in contexts familiar to other members of their genus:
• The trademark “zuus… zuus” vocalization is announced during encounters with potential threats from the ground. This call also appears to serve as a general contact call.
• A low guttural call has also occasionally been observed during human presence in their area, as well as with encounters with wild individuals. This vocalization is accompanied by an abrupt slinging back of the head, during which the individual typically approaches observers within a few meters.
• A loud “couk-couk-couk-couk” bark vocalization is given when in the presence of large raptors overhead. A similar response is given in reaction to low-flying helicopters and aircraft.
• A lost call is a series of low whistles, not dissimilar to that of the crested coua (Coua cristata), a bird whose whistles are distinct and well-separated, eventually decreasing in volume.
Other forms of communication include visual cues to suggest sexual readiness, such as genital swelling in both males and females. Grooming is often a bonding behavior, and olfactory (scent) cues are used to maintain territorial boundaries.
Very little is known about the reproduction and offspring care of the Perrier’s sifaka, as most information was originally based on observations of the diademed sifaka. More research relating to the Perrier’s sifaka is needed.
What is known is that a sifaka’s reproductive cycle is seasonal, and sifakas reproduce either every one or two years. Swelling of the genitalia in both genders indicates readiness to mate. Sifaka infants have a slow growth rate, which may be surprising to some, given the abundance of food in their habitat. Most female sifakas do not put much effort into individual offspring, as half of their infants die before they reach one year of age. Perrier’s sifaka infants are weaned from their mother’s milk, thus becoming independent, at the age of two, and reach sexual maturity at the age of four for females, and five for males.
Tooth development in sifakas tends to happen at a more rapid rate during maturity, which would seem to allow them to be more nutritionally active. A working hypothesis speculates that this is to reduce the amount of time that offspring are dependent upon the adult(s), and to increase the chance of survival for the mother, who, as a result, does not have to expend time and energy in raising her young. More research needs to be done in order to fully understand this developmental characteristic.
As fruit-eaters, Perrier’s sifakas aid in the regeneration of their forest habitats by dispersing seeds through their feces as they move around the habitat. They also play a role in pollination. Like bees and butterflies, they collect pollen from flowers when consuming the flowers. They then deposit the pollen on each flower they visit, thereby pollinating the plants. In addition, by feeding extensively on young leaves, they largely strip trees of their young leaves. This stimulates the trees to recover by producing a new set of young leaves, thereby increasing their productivity and growth rate. Finally, as a prey species, they also play a role in feeding local predators within their range.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists the Perrier’s sifaka as Critically Endangered (IUCN, 2018), appearing on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
The Perrier’s sifaka is one of the rarest and most endangered lemurs (and primates) in the world. There are likely less than 500 individuals in the wild and a total of approximately 125 mature individuals.
They are most frequently found in one protected area: the Analamerana Special Reserve. A small number may also still be found in the eastern section of Ankarana National Park, which is connected through a series of forest patches to populations in the Andriafiamena and Analamerana forests. They have also recently been seen in unprotected forest patches between Analamerana and Ankarana, and are present in the Andavakoera Classified Forest, but possibly in very low numbers.
The greatest threat facing the Perrier’s sifaka is slash-and-burn agricultural practices in which forested land is clearcut and any remaining vegetation is burned. This produces an ashy layer of fertilizer with which to grow crops. Additional threats include fires set to increase livestock pasture, cutting trees to produce charcoal, forest destruction caused by miners, and hunting by humans for food. In addition, when they descend to the ground during the dry season, they are vulnerable to predators and hunters.
The Perrier’s sifaka is listed in Appendix I of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), an international agreement between governments whose goal is to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten their survival.
There is an urgent need for a full-time, long-term scientific presence in the Analamerana Special Reserve, as well as an expansion of this protected area to include the forests of Andriafiamena, and a connection to Ankarana. This particular effort should also include an education campaign in the region, as well as surveys in nearby forest patches to locate any other populations of Perrier’s sifakas.
Additional conservation actions needed include properly enforced land and water management and protection, as well as site and area protection and management. Research into sifaka captivity is needed to establish ex situ (outside of the natural habitat) conservation for the Perrier’s sifaka, as none are being raised in captivity. Finally, population densities of sifakas on sandstone soil are more than twice the population density found on limestone soils. This critical fact needs to be included in the “conservation equation”, and protecting sandstone sites should become a priority if the Perrier’s sifaka has a chance at surviving the plight of extinction.
- https://www.alltheworldsprimates.org/Members/Home/MasterPrimate.aspx?tid=56
- https://animalia.bio/perriers-sifaka
- https://arca.igc.pt/bitstream/10400.7/560/1/Salmona_2013_Propithecus_perrieri_distribution.pdf
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perrier%27s_sifaka
- https://www.gbif.org/es/species/5707425
- https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/18361/115573556
- https://lemur.duke.edu/discover/meet-the-lemurs/coquerels-sifaka/
- https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jordi-Salmona/publication/321431440_Perrier’s_Sifaka_Propithecus_perrieri_Lavauden_1931_Madagascar/links/5a2193ccaca2727dd87ab820/Perriers-Sifaka-Propithecus-perrieri-Lavauden-1931-Madagascar.pdf
- https://www.underwater.org/mermaid/Madagascar/mammals/index.html
Written by Sienna Weinstein, August 2024