By Marina Blanco, Ph.D., DLC-SAVA Post-Doctoral Project Coordinator The “Lemur Day Festival” was celebrated on Halloween in the SAVA region of Madagascar this year! DLC-SAVA Conservation, along with NGOs like World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Lemur Conservation Foundation (LCF), Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), and others assisted with the organization and celebrated the day with school students in […]
Join our Conservation Coordinator, Charlie Welch, for the trip of a lifetime this summer! You do NOT need to be a Duke alumnus/a to join us for this amazing tour of Madagascar! Lots more info available here, including a gorgeous multi-page brochure: https://lemur.duke.edu/protect/madagascar-ecotour/. We hope you’ll join us!
Six-year-old male ring-tailed lemur Jones may look like he is a lemur somewhat lacking in arms as he sniffs a sapling in Natural Habitat Enclosure #9, but rest assured, he is a well-armed male in the prime of life! His odd posture is due to the fact that, in typical male ring-tail marking behavior, he […]
By Matt Borths, Curator of the Duke Lemur Center’s Division of Fossil Primates. Meet Megaladapis, a gorilla-sized lemur that would have moved like an enormous koala! This giant lemur only went extinct between 500 and 300 years ago. Some researchers think there are trees in Madagascar that are still around that relied on Megaladapis to […]
Thrasher, a 12-year-old fat-tailed dwarf lemur, proudly displays his beautiful thick tail — evidence that the DLC’s mouse and dwarf lemurs have begun entering the initial phases of their yearly period of torpor! If Thrasher were a wild lemur living in Madagascar, the fat stored in his tail would help him survive the cool dry […]
Today is our first Fossil Friday, courtesy of Matt Borths, our new Curator of the DLC’s Division of Fossil Primates! This week we’re featuring… ELEPHANT BIRDS! A new species of elephant bird was announced this week: https://www.livescience.com/63675-worlds-largest-bird-is-vo…. Only a few hundred years ago, Madagascar was home to the largest bird ever known: Vorombe titan! This new genus […]
New paper out on the sifaka gut microbiome and metabolome relative to the quality of dietary foliage, using non-invasive research done right here at the Duke Lemur Center! Read the full article here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-32759-7. For a great introduction to the gut microbiome, why it’s critical for lemurs’ health, and the practical use and benefits of the […]
One of our volunteer Technician Assistants suggested recently that we add a “Staff Spotlight” to the DLC’s monthly volunteer newsletter. We loved the idea so much that we’ve expanded it into monthly blog posts as well! Many friends of the DLC know us in passing, but may not know what led us to our careers or what […]
